Ludhiana, August 31: About five days after the Jharkhand police registered a case against an illegal shelter home, Packiam Mercy Cross Trust, Phullawal, where 38 children from Jharkhand and other states were staying, the Ludhiana Commissionerate on Friday booked the home owner, Satyandra Prakash Musa.
The city police registered a case under the Juvenile Justice Act at Sadar police station. Police Commissioner Dr Sukhchain Gill told The Tribune that they had acted on the recommendation of the district administration. As per the administration, the shelter home was being run without mandatory registration.
Source said the District Child Protection Officer had also recommended the registration of a case under the Act.
Meanwhile, ADC Shena Aggarwal said she had completed a probe and would submit her report to the Deputy Commissioner on Monday.
Musa is already facing a case under Section 4 of the Jharkhand Religious Freedom Act, Section 42 of the Juvenile Justice Act, Section 5 of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act and Section 370 (trafficking of persons) of the IPC. His former student, Junool Loga, was also booked by the Jharkhand police.
“Junool did matriculation during his stay at the shelter home here and went back to Jharkhand in 2011. Now, he was selecting poor, tribal children and sending them to the shelter home here,” Sadar SDPO (subdivisional police officer) Amar Kumar Pandey told The Tribune over the phone from Jharkhand.
Working chairman of the Council of Ludhiana Churches K Koshy said Musa was a holder of MA and MEd degrees.
He is married to a woman based in Tamil Nadu. He worked as a lecturer in a private institution in Chandigarh when he was serving as pastor in a church there. After selling his properties in Jharkhand, Musa shifted to Punjab in 2004, where he started the shelter home on his own land.
“Musa was serving the poor. He is not involved in religious conversion,” Koshy added.
The Jharkhand police on Thursday claimed to have traced 14 children out of 30 who had gone missing from the shelter home.
Eight children were earlier rescued by the Jharkhand police during a raid on August 20.
The shelter home was allegedly involved in child trafficking and religion conversions.
Musa has already denied the charges of conversion. He said these children came through churches or through children belonging to Jharkhand, but studying in Ludhiana.
Source Tribune India
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