New Delhi, June 8 (FN Representative) The National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has launched a “CiSS application” under the Baal Swaraj portal to help in the rehabilitation process of Children in Street Situations. (CiSS), the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development announced on Wednesday. Baal Swaraj is a portal launched by NCPCR for online tracking and digital real-time monitoring mechanism of children in need of care and protection. The portal has two functions- COVID care and CiSS. The COVID Care link caters to the children who have lost either or both parents due to COVID-19 or otherwise post March 2020. According to the Union Ministry, the portal, developed by NCPCR, is a first-of-its-kind initiative in India to help children in street situations. “The CiSS application is used for receiving data of children in street situations from all the states and union territories, tracking their rescue and rehabilitation process.
The initiative is taken under the direction of the Supreme Court of India,” a statement issued from the NCPCR said. The program embodies Article 51 (A) of the Constitution of India, as it provides a platform to the public and organizations catering to the welfare of the children to report any child in need of assistance. The platform serves to collect data and report to the District Child Protection Officer (DCPO) for them to take necessary action. According to the Ministry, the newly launched application follows six stages framework for the rehabilitation of children. “The first stage is the collection of the child’s details, which is accomplished through the portal. The second stage is Social Investigating Report (SIR) i.e. investigating the child’s background. This is done under the supervision of the District Child Protection Unit (DCPU) by the District Child Protection Officer (DCPO) by conversing and counselling the child.
The third stage is formulating an Individual Care Plan (ICP) for the child. The fourth stage is the order of the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) based on the SIR submitted to the CWC. The fifth stage is allocating the schemes and benefits that the beneficiary can avail of. And in the sixth stage, a checklist is made for the evaluation of the progress,” the Union Ministry informed. The Standard Operating Procedure for Care and Protection of Children in Street Situations recognises any child under the ‘Children in Street Situation’ category if the child is living on the streets alone, living on the streets during the day, or living on the streets with the family. The root cause of this phenomenon is the migration of families from rural to urban areas in search of a better standard of living.