Over 26,000 missing in Telangana

Advanced tools fail to bring numbers down Despite the police boasting about latest tools including facial recognition to trace missing persons, the number of persons who have gone missing remains high.

Hyderabad; A whopping 26,618 people, including 15,703 women and girls, are missing in Telangana, according to NCRB report 2022.

All over India, a total of 7,85,052 people including 4,97,393 women are missing. The highest number of missing persons recorded in the country is from West Bengal with 1,12,526 persons missing including 75,835 women, followed by Maharashtra with 1,10,221 persons. On the third position is Madhya Pradesh with 98,901 persons missing and it includes 68,700 women. Telangana stands ninth in the list.

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Advanced tools fail to bring numbers down Despite the police boasting about latest tools including facial recognition to trace missing persons, the number of persons who have gone missing remains high.

Concerns are raised over such a large number of persons, particularly women, remaining untraced. MBT party spokesperson Amjedullah Khan, who also takes up missing cases when families approach for help, complains about lack of professionalism on the part of the police.

“At the most, the police check call details of the person and issue a lookout circular. The families themselves are asked to run around to different places and check. Only in cases where children are feared kidnapped, the police act following pressure from higher officials,” he said.

Social activist SQ Masood alleges that a case often gets watered down with missing person being mentioned as mentally disturbed. In instances of a marital discord, the police ask the husband to go to the in-laws’ house and check for himself, bothering little about the man’s safety.

“Also, poor families can’t afford to spend money running around to search for their loved ones,” he said. ‘Majority migrants’ The TS police say majority of the missing persons are migrants who come in search of livelihood. “At times, family doesn’t bother to inform police once the person is traced or returns,” said an official.