Jazeera, on a protest in front of the Secretariat since early August, refused to let go of her three children as child welfare officials tried to get their custody on Thursday.
Childline director P.D. Thomas said the police had asked the Child Welfare Committee to shift Rizwana, 12, Shifana, 10, and Mohammed, an infant, since they were unsafe on the roadside.
“The police said their education was suffering and that there were safety issues too. It is not against the mother or her protest,” Fr. Thomas said.
Ms. Jazeera, who has been fighting the sand mafia in Kannur, resisted the efforts of Childline officials; her opposition only grew stronger when the officials sought police help.
Assurance
“We have contacted her husband, and she has asked for time till Friday evening to take a decision. We have convinced her that the children will be lodged in a safe place as she continues her protest,” a Childline official said.
Earlier, dramatic scenes played out at the protest venue, all the more when a youngster talking to her was taken to the cantonment police station. Ms. Jazeera ran to the station with Mohammed in her arms and Shifana accompanying her, television cameras following her every move.
She wanted to know why the youngster was taken into custody.
The police said they called him for questioning since he had first claimed to be a journalist and then a journalism student.
He was allowed to leave soon after, and Ms. Jazeera returned to her protest spot, still refusing to let her children go with Childline officials.
She later told presspersons that she was frightened by the presence of the police and hence did not want her children to be taken away.
She was, in fact, waiting for her children to be shifted to safety, possibly where their education did not suffer, till her protest was over. She was, however, capable of taking care of them on her own, as she had been doing all these years.
