With its relief centre for the rehabilitation of beggars overflowing with inmates, the Kochi Corporation has been forced to look the other way even as begging goes unchecked at major city centres. The situation is so grim that there is a ban on admitting new inmates at the Palluruthy Relief Settlement (PRS). It already has 190-odd inmates against its stated capacity of less than 150.
Since a majority of the inmates settled at PRS are from other States, space gets freed up as and when the inmates, whose nativity is identified, are handed over to authorities of respective States.
“The handing over involves some formalities, which are carried out with the help of the Kerala State Legal Services Authority. Last month six Bengali inmates were handed over to the West Bengal Legal Services Authority,” said T.V. Sivadas, superintendent at PRS.
Murugan, social activist and general secretary of Theruvu Velicham, a campaign launched by the Social Justice Department for the rehabilitation of destitute, said space was at a premium in 194 government-recognised institutions for the rehabilitation of different categories of destitute, including beggars.
“Many of the inmates at these institutions have a family and home to return to. There needs to be an intensive drive to identity them and return them over so that space is available for the needful,” he said. The Theruvu Velicham home at Kakkanad rescued 120-odd persons from begging in the last two months against its capacity of 30. While many of them were reunited with their families, the others had to be accommodated in institutions in other districts owing to the space constraint here. Space, he said, was just one reason with apathy towards beggars an equally pressing issue.
Meanwhile, begging has become more of an organised practice. Murugan said some leprosy patients had become a regular feature near a city hospital. “Most of them are from Tamil Nadu. Their movements are severely restricted, but they are dropped near the hospital in the mornings and picked up in the evenings without fail,” he said.
