Fed up with spending sleepless nights with alcoholic parents in a roadside tent, a 14-year-old girl faked a suicide attempt in a bid to find a safe shelter.
The girl, a school dropout, escaped from the tent her parents stay in with six of their children at Kalasamangalam in KV Kuppam and reached Katpadi where she pretended as if she was going to jump into a well on Saturday.
When locals rushed to her rescue, she told them that her father had been sexually abusing her in an inebriated mood. She also said she had lost her mother. She was handed over to the local police who alerted Social Welfare Department officers.
The girl narrated her ordeal to a team of staff and volunteers led by District Social Welfare Officer (DSWO) Murugeswari.
“When we heard her initially, we had some doubts. So, we decided to conduct a probe,” said Murugeswari.
The investigation team visited the place where the girl’s parents were staying and found her mother sitting with her siblings, proving her claims false.
The DSWO explained, “Further inquiries revealed that the girl had been feeling insecure and wanted a safe shelter. With this in mind, she pretended to kill herself and then claimed she had lost her mother. When we countered her with what we found, she admitted to having lied to get a safe shelter."
The father and mother of the girl, who is the oldest of the siblings, are rag pickers. Both used to take alcohol and did not care for their children, the inquiries revealed. Moreover, the girl’s mother was pregnant, expecting the seventh child.
Now, the girl has pleaded with officials for a safe shelter for her and her siblings -- two boys and three girls -- for which efforts are being made.
“We are going to rescue the other children too and accommodate them in a home, besides arranging education for all of them,” Murugeswari said.
Moreover, district collector A Shanmuga Sundaram has initiated necessary action for rehabilitation of the family by providing them a house under a government scheme.