Sanjukta Panigrahi , eminent Woman Activist filed complaint before Secretary , Women and Child Development Department and Collector, Khorda to bring KISS under Juvenile Justice Act
To
The Secretary
Department of Women and Child
Development
Govt. of Odisha
Bhubaneswar
The Collector, Khurda
Sub- Seeking an inquiry and Registration
of Kalinga Institute of Social Science ( KISS), Patia, Bhubaneswar under Juvenile Justice Act.
Sir
I Smt. Sanjukta Panigrahi ,
Woman Activist residing in Plot No.
396/4306, Kanak Durga Nagar, Post-KIIT, Bhubaneswar-751024 bring to your
kind notice the
following complaint about
management of KISS for
your urgent intervention and necessary action.
1. Kalinga Institute
of Social Science, an NGO is managing a tribal school named KISS Tribal School in
Chandaka and Pathargadia area under Patia Mouza of Bhubaneswar for 30 years.
Sri Achyut Samant, the Founder of KISS always publicly claims that his Institution is providing 30,000 poor
and distress tribal children free education, free hostel facility and free
food, cloth etc. Neither Central Govt.
nor State Govt. provides any kind of support
for the tribal children.
2. To ascertain the
fact and factuality of claim of Achyut Samant,
RTI Application was filed to the
PIO, office of Principal, KSS for supply
of information about management of KISS. But
the KISS Authority denied to
supply any kind of information, as their institution does not come
under purview of RTI Act. Few Social Activists of our state had
filed multiple RTI Applications to various Govt. Department of State and
Central Government to access
the information about expenses made/ support , if any provided by Govt.
3. RTI Application was
submitted to the Collector, Khorda seeking information about exact number of
tribal children reading in KISS Tribal School. RTI Application was transferred
to Block Education Officer, Bhubaneswar for supply of information. On 10.1.2022, the
Block Education Officer, Bhubaneswar
supplied the information stating that 16,765 tribal
children are studying in the school
against claim of 30,000 children by
Achyut Samant ( annexture-1). Similarly, the KISS
Authority in a letter
addressed to the Child Welfare Committee, Khorda dated
18.4.2019 has mentioned about total no.
of 19,232 children studying in the School ( Annnexture-2). The abovementioned figure of tribal children proves claim of Sri Samant as false.
4. As per information
obtained from the Department and SC and
ST welfare , Govt. of Odisha on 26.7.22, it
was found that the State Govt. is
providing subsided rice ( 15 kg per head per month) @ Rs. 9.30 per kg
for 10,000 tribal children of KISS School. ( Information is attached as Annexture-3).
5. Similarly, Ministry
of Tribal Affairs, Govt. of Odisha
has sanctioned Rs. 12 crore from
2007-08 to 2011-12, Rs. 21.42 during period of 2017-18 to 2018-19 and Rs. 20.00 from 2019-20 to 2021-22
for development of infrastructure of the
School. ( Annexture-4)
6. On 17.4.2017 ,
Subas Mohapatra, Human Rights Activist
had filed a complaint before Child Welfare Committee, Khorda , a Statutory
body empowered to monitor tribal hostels under Juvenile Justice Act alleging mal-functioning of KISS School. On
19.6.2017, a Team of CWC, Khorda visited
the school and conducted thorough
inquiry into allegation. We access the report of CWC and found
the observation and recommendation made
by the Team. It is as follows. ( Annexture-5)
Observation of the Team
a. There are no
sufficient toilet available for huge
number of children living in the hostel.
b. Many of the bath rooms and toilets are left
broken.
c. The living
space for the children
is too congested to live comfortably.
d. The Institution
is not
recognized by Tribal Welfare
Dept. of Govt. of Odisha
e. Due to insufficient
nutrition, the children are found under nourished and anaemic.
f. The children are not given
enough scope or opportunity to express their feelings and emotions.
g. There is no proper
grievance redressal mechanism exist in the institution. The children suffer when they have any problem.
h. There are few children who are orphans and there are
children who are having single children.
Recommendation of
the Team
a. Since the institution has accommodated some
children in need of care and protection ( CNCP) , it needs to be
recognized by Department of Women and
Child Development under Juvenile Justice
Act.. This would help the government officials
of JJ System to verify standard
of care.
b. Within the existing
infrastructure, it is not correct to
accommodate such a huge number of children. Hence either
the number of children should be
reduced or necessary infrastructure should be developed to meet the needs of the children.
c. The inmates should be provided with necessary toilets and bathroom service immediately
for comfortable living of
the children as it is their right.
7. In view of
Report of CWC, Khorda, a team
of Social Activists Smt. Sanjukta
Panigrahi, Pradip Pradhan and Pratap
Sahu filed a complaint dated 5.12.2018 in respect of non-registration of KISS under
section 41 of the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015. On 10.4.2019, hearing the
Complaint, the Additional Child Welfare Committee, Khorda directed KISS
Authority to produce all such children before the Addl. CWC, Khorda as earliest
as possible and make all necessary arrangements for registration of institution
under Juvenile Justice Act. Similarly, on 2.3.2019, the CWC, Khorda also directed
the Collector, Khorda to take
immediate and urgent action to ensure
registration of the Institution under JJ Act. ( Annexture-6)
8. Despite several
direction by the Statutory Body and existence of statutory law, the KISS
Authority avoided the
registration of KISS under JJ Act
and took unnecessary pleas to avoid
registration.
9. On 9.7.21, RTI
Application was filed to the PIO, Office
of Collector, Khorda seeking information
about total no. of Institutions/ organizations housing poor, vulnerable
children registered under JJ Act and organisations which are not registered. On 2.8.21, the District Welfare Officer supplied
list of all 47 Institutions housing
vulnerable children of
Khorda district except KISS, Bhubaneswar
registered under Juvenile Justice Act. ( Annexture-7)
It is alleged that
as Achyut Samant has strong influence over administration due to his political link to the then Ruling BJD Party , he successfully
influenced the district administration which did not
take any steps to register KISS
under JJ Act. The Officials under
political pressure did not take any steps to
monitor the KISS Hostel and
register it.
I, therefore urge
you to take any steps as required
under law and register KISS under Juvenile Justice Act.
Yours sincerely
Sanjukta Panigrahi
M- 9337903294
Date- 6.3.25
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