• Days before Holi in 2003, 5-year-old Anju went missing while playing with friends outside her home. Ever since, Sushila and Anil Tandi, her parents, have been making daily rounds of the Khamardih police station. Sushila now doesn’t let her other two children out of sight. Anil has searched Nagpur, Bhopal, Gwalior, even Delhi but has had no luck. “Whenever I approach the police, they tell me, ‘Tumhari beti ko dhoondhne ke alawa aur koi kaam nahi hai kya hamare paas’ (Do you think we have no other work than to look for your daughter?)”. So whenever Anil manages to save money, he sets out in search of his daughter himself.

• Six-year-old Sonia Rao went missing on August 14 last year while on her way home from school in Raipur.She was later found in Nagpur, where she had been sold by child-lifters within hours of her abduction. But it wasn’t the police who sniffed her out. Sonia’s mother, Sharda Rao, led a crowd from her colony to the Collectorate and police station for two days to mount pressure on the administration. “I was shattered but knew that if I didn’t act quickly chances of seeing my daughter again were slim.” The pressure tactics worked, teams went out and Sonia was traced to an orphanage in Nagpur where she had been kept by the Maharashtra Police. Three persons were arrested on charges of involvement in trafficking. It’s another matter that the Chhattisgarh Police learnt of Sonia’s return almost six days later.

... contd.