Last week, I wrote about the study on the problems associated with rapid return of children to their families as part of pandemic precaution measures (HERE). Shortly before that blog became public, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) in India directed 8 states to ensure that children living in Child Care Institutions there were returned to their families preferably within 100 days. This is very alarming news.
The eight states in question (Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala, Mizoram, and Meghalaya), account for almost 72% of children living in institutions in India, or around 184,000 children. These eight states are to be the first phase of the Indian rapid deinstitutionalisation effort. When the children from these states have been reunited with their families, the plan is to roll out the programme to other states.
Under ideal circumstances, doing everything that is needed to safely reintegrate a child into her family in 100 days would be impossible. Suggesting that this be done for almost 200,000 children, when the country is still in the early stages of building awareness and skills around what is required for the effective and safe transformation of care, during a pandemic that leaves officials overburdened and families in crisis due to extreme poverty, is quite frankly reckless. It is important to remember that most of the families of institutionalised children will be worse off now than they were when they decided to place their children in an institution because they felt unable to provide them with the care they needed.
The chances of successful reintegration of children into their families without the proper assessment, support and continued monitoring are very low. This means that children will be at risk of ending up on the streets, being married off, having to do dangerous labour, being trafficked, or living in a dangerous situation at home.
The NCPCR uses all the right arguments in favour of deinstitutionalisation in the order that they sent to the state governments. They explain that institutional care should only be used as a last resort because it is not in the child’s best interest, while currently, it is often the default type of alternative care used. They mention that it is worrying that a large number of children are institutionalised simply because of poverty of the family, which is not acceptable. And they also point out that children are at higher risk of abuse when they are institutionalised. All these things are very true and it is great that the NCPCR is bringing up the importance of moving towards family-based care. However, none of that changes the fact that it is very dangerous to send children back to their families without proper assessment, support, and continued monitoring.
Ever since I learned about this, I have been working very hard, in cooperation with others, to try to do some damage control at two levels. On the top-down level, I am trying to mobilise contacts and persuade officials to extend the deadline and/or to accept emergency intensive training and capacity building in order to make sure that key decision-makers are aware of what is involved in responsible deinstitutionalisation. At the grassroots level, I am developing a strategy and plan of action for institutions to make sure that everything possible is done to make the most of the time given once the order is given to start moving children out. To fast-track assessments, development of care plans and putting in place support as much as possible so that when there is no choice left and children need to be moved out, they are as well prepared and supported as we can make them given the circumstances, to avoid them being traumatised and put at serious risk.
I really hope the extending of the deadline is going to work, however. Because if not, I fear for the children. I want to see deinstitutionalisation done as soon as possible, but only in ways that protect the children along the way. Just shoving children out the door of an institution is not deinstitutionalisation, it is an abdication of responsibility and sacrificing children in the process. And unfortunately, it is something that is happening in many countries at the moment. India is not unique in this, it is just that I have a bigger role to play on the ground there.
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