1098 receives more prank calls than SOS

The helpline for children (1098) gets lakhs of calls every year. But shockingly, only a miniscule number of calls are genuine.

Of the 2.21 lakh calls received at the call centre in Bengaluru between January and November 2014, only 5.2 per cent were intervention calls. The remaining were unrelated.

Prank calls

An employee at the childline says that many callers speak “inappropriately” and use vulgar language.

“Pranksters call us repeatedly. The only mechanism to deal with them is to either avoid these calls or pass on the phone to male colleagues.”

Majority of the calls were blank and silent, which constituted 72 per cent of the total calls received.

Besides, 10,560 calls made to the helpline were prank or abusive calls.

The employee added that as there was only one line till November 2014, important callers would have to hear the busy tone.

Since December last, calls from Karnataka are being directed to the childline in Chennai, which has 20 lines and caters to all southern States. Only calls that need intervention are passed on to their nodal agencies in Bengaluru.

Reporting by Tanu Kulkarni