Guwahati, July 17: The state social welfare and health departments are yet to reply to Assam Human Rights Commission’s notice asking them to submit a report about the circumstances that led to the death of Dikshita Barman, an HIV-positive orphan girl, in April this year.
The commission had issued the notice to the two departments on May 11 after a city-based NGO lodged a complaint with it, on the basis of a news item published in The Telegraph on April 23, highlighting how the four-year-old girl had died after being shifted from one care centre to another.
Commission member J.P. Chaliha said there had been no communication from either of the departments, though they had been asked to inquire into the circumstances leading to her death and submit a report to the commission within 45 days.
“In our notice to the commissioner secretaries of the social welfare and health departments on May 11, we had asked them to carry out a thorough inquiry into the circumstances leading to the child’s death, but they have not replied till now. We had also asked the two departments to discuss the matter with the people associated with the care and treatment of the child and submit a detailed report to us,” Chaliha said.
Dikshita was found in a goat shed at her uncle’s house in Nalbari in December last year after she lost her parents to AIDS. She was brought to Guwahati by a local NGO on December 11 and was being taken care of in a community care centre run by Bhorukha Public Welfare Trust, another NGO. She was given anti-retroviral treatment and her condition improved a lot.
But suddenly, the Child Welfare Committee (Kamrup) under the social welfare department and the Assam State AIDS Control Society decided to send her to a care centre run by the Missionaries of Charity at Lankeswar on the city’s outskirts. She was shifted to the new centre, Shantidaan, on April 2 and four days later died of a serious bout of stomach problem.
On May 5, the commission registered a case (116/18/2011-12) after an NGO, Consumer’s Legal Protection Forum, complained that Dikshita had died in the absence of a special care centre. It also asked the departments to outline the steps being taken by the government to take care of other HIV-positive orphans in the state.
Chaliha said the commission would soon send a reminder to the departments to submit the report.
immediately, as the two departments had not intimated the reason why they were taking so much time to reply to the notice.
