27 persons rescued from dark dungeon of illegal ashram

Mangalore, Feb 4: Women and Child Welfare Department and the police raided an orphanage and old age home, reportedly been functioning without necessary permissions, on Sunday night. As many as 27 inmates who were kept in no better conditions than captives were rescued from the Centre. However, an inmate's statement that they were subjected to sexual harassment has opened avenues for the police to look into the case more critically.

Gathering details from the local residents on an orphanage run in a bungalow named 'Sandesha' at Nanthoor, cops and social welfare department officials raided the centre late in the night.

It is said that a young girl who managed to escape from the centre on Sunday evening had pleaded the locals to give her security and save her from the clutches of the ones running the centre. The locals in response to this had intimated the Social Welfare Department and the police.

“There are elderly and youth living in this centre. All of us are beaten up but the young girls are being subjected to sexual harassment by the ones running the centre,” the girl has complained.

The rescued inmates have said that the rooms not bigger than jail cells are given to two inmates. Men and women have to share rooms and the situation of the aged living here is worse. They said that they are being given meals only once a day.

It is said that the kids who had left their aged parents here have been sending good amount to the centre to take care of their parents. But, this amount has not been utilized on the inmates.

The centre has been running since a year now. However, the local residents never got to know the situation in the centre. The locals said that if they tried to have a look at the centre, the person named Upendra Nayak, who is running the centre used to shun them away. Nobody had the permission to even linger near the compound walls of the centre. The locals say that there are possibilities of at least nine persons having died in the centre over the last one year.

The girl who escaped from the centre said that some sort of medicines were mixed in the food and given to the inmates. They all lived like captives in the centre without any contact of the outside world.

The 27 rescued from the centre have been admitted to wenlock hospital.