Tek Narayan Bhattarai

Police have arrested an overseer at the District Development Committee (DDC) of Palpa for his alleged involvement in trafficking of underage school girls.

According to the police, overseer Santosh Karki, who hails of Masyam VDC-1, was detained as he faces the charge of trafficking three school girls, all of them under sixteen years of age, studying in grade nine at a school in district headquarters Tansen.

The District Court has remanded the accused to seven days of police custody for further investigation on Thursday.

“Parental consent is a must to take any underage children for any overnight outing,” said District Court judge Daya Nath Kharel. “However, in this incident, the accused is found deliberately taking the girls for overnight stay outside their houses without the knowledge of their parents. So, his intention cannot be taken on good faith,” Kharel told Repblica.

“The court would, nonetheless, give its verdict after hearing the statements of the victims and studying the evidence submitted by the police,” Kharel added.

The police nabbed Karki on the basis of a complaint registered by father of one of the victims. “The initial investigation and the victim´s statements clearly suggest that it is a case of trafficking in girls,” said Deputy Superintendent of Police Shiva Shrestha.

Karki was taking the girls to Butwal, luring them of jobs in the city. The girls said that Karki had promised them job in a hotel with a handsome salary ranging from 70-90 thousand rupees per month.

The police had sprung to action after a father of one of the girls registered police complaint of his missing daughter. The police had expedited the search after the parents of other two girls reached police station asking for help in searching for their missing daughters.

Karki was nabbed last Saturday and the girls were rescued from a room at Barudkhana on the same day, according to Police Inspector Raj Kumar Khiuju.

According to the girls, Karki was planning to take them to Butwal on Sunday. After learning that the police were searching him over the disappearance of the girls, Karki had called the girls and asked them to go back to their homes saying that ´Butwal plan has been cancelled for the time being´.

Karki had booked a hotel with a fake name address and phone number to keep the girls in Tansen before transporting them to Butwal. A CCTV footage at the hotel shows that Karki was with the girls while checking in and out of the hotel, according to DSP Shrestha.

Published on: 28 March 2014 | Republica