BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan chaired a high-level meeting of officials in Bhopal on Friday in the wake of the alleged rape and molestation of deaf and mute girls at a private hostel in the state capital.
"I'm saddened by the incident and the accused will be brought to justice by the police and prosecution through the filing of the charge-sheet in the case at the earliest," said Chouhan after the meeting.
At the meeting, the CM also issued directions for carrying monthly inspection of all government, private and aided shelter homes and hostels for girls. Presently, such inspection is carried out once in every two months.
Chouhan also said that proper rules and guidelines will be framed soon for private hostels housing girls. Meanwhile, the MP social justice and disability welfare department will hold enquiry into operations of around 100 NGOs and social organizations funded by the department.
The department's Principal Secretary Ashok Shah issued orders in this regard on Friday and fixed a month deadline for completing the enquiry. The enquiry will cover all the shelter homes and hostels run by social organizations and NGOs.Statements of students residing in such hostels would be recorded by the enquiry teams.
The income status of the heads of such hostels, provision of CCTVs in these hostels and other details too will be probed. In a significant development, the joint director of the department, Manoj Tiwari told on Friday that the private hostel run by Ashwini Sharma or his NGO was not funded by the department.
Similarly, the officials at the women and child development department also made it clear that Sharma's NGO or hostel was neither registered with the department nor receiving any government grants. It has also come to the fore that around a year back some ITI students residing at the concerned private hostel had complained to social justice department about Sharma troubling them and not giving them proper food and lodging facilities during their stay at the hostel.
The department conducted the enquiry into the complaints and ordered the closure of the illegal hostel, after which it was shut. Importantly, the department renders Rs 4000 monthly scholarship to specially-abled students undergoing vocational training at ITI.
Meanwhile, the opposition Congress launched a scathing attack on the ruling BJP in the wake of the incident. Party's state media in-charge Shobha Oza said the government is trying to cover up the matter as the accused Ashwini Sharma is close to one of the ministers in the state government and a ruling party MLA, besides having good ties with some key bureaucrats.'Responding to Oza's allegations, MP minister of state for cooperatives and local BJP MLA Vishwas Sarang said "we don't take Congress' allegations seriously as the opposition party has become habitual of making baseless allegations every now and then."
MP State Congress chief Kamal Nath wrote a letter to CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan, demanding CBI probe into the shocking episode. He also demanded that the government should make public the list of all NGOs registered with the government. He also demanded that the government make public details of public funds being provided to NGOs and social organization under different schemes.