& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

Saudi Arabia taking tough action to stamp out begging rackets
DUBAI, Jan 28: Saudi Arabia is taking tough action to stamp out begging rackets exploiting children, many of them handicapped girls as young as five found barefoot and hungry on the streets of the oil-rich kingdom, reports AFP.
In the first two weeks of the month of Ramadan — a particularly lucrative time for beggars, Saudi authorities have arrested more than 120 Indian children suspected of being the victims of well-organised trafficking rings.
Two weeks ago. Saudi Arabia deported 76 Indian child beggars aged between five and 15. all girls except for one boy. Nearly all had deformed limbs.
The Indian Embassy in Riyadh said another 46 children who have been rounded up
and held in a deportation centre in the Red Sea port of Jeddah are expected to be expelled in the next few days.
According to the Indian press, the 76 youngsters, now housed in a state-run orphanage in Bombay, were victims of traffickers who send children to Saudi Arabia to beu during pilgrimages to Makkah. site ot Islam's holiest shrines.
Begging, a phenomenon foreign to our society, multiplies during the month of Ramadan, considered a period of mutual help." said Ihsan Saleh Taleb, social affairs director in the western region of Saudi Arabia.
"However, professional beggars organised In gangs have over the past few years been exploiting handicapped children to arouse pity among citizens."
Taleb added.
Indian police have launched an investigation into allegations that children from* the state of West Bengal are being forced to beg in Saudi Arabia, and have already arrested two Indians.
The authorities are also taking steps to identify Saudi Arabian contacts of the childrunners of West Bengal." Calcutta Police Inspector-General H.A. Safwi said on Sunday.
Safwi said police had established that touts bought children from poor families in Murshidabad. a Muslim-major-Ity district of West Bengal.
Other sources say touts In West Bengal and Saudi Arabia prey on Indian Muslims in the Gulf nation, offering them money to use their children for
begging during the annual Hajj pilgrimage and Ramadan.
It is extreme poverty that drives this racket. Most of the time the parents know what the children are being taken away for. They get some money and keep quiet." said Sarfraz Ar zoo, a Bombay journalist.
He said India has been exporting child beggars to Middle East countries for several years, picking them up from impoverished Muslim families.
The gangs usually send three or four children with one adult, so that immigration officers in the receiving country do not suspect," he said. 'The younger children are. more money they bring in for the gangs.
Faced with this latest outbreak. Saudi Arabia has beefed
up its anti-begging campaign and intensified patrols, particularly around the time betore Iftar. the daily meal marking the end of fasting, said Taieb.
Offices working on the prob lems first opened at the start of the 1990s and are now spread across the kingdom. particularly In the holv towns of Makkah and Medina
Saleh AI Ghamdi deputy di rector of an office in Jeddah, said a group of 16 young beggars led by a woman and which was operating out of four apart ments In Makkah had recently been dismantled
Beggars seized around Makkah and Jeddah were of various nationalities Saudis represent only one per cent of the tojai. Ghamdi said
The truly needy are taken
under the wings of volunteer as-sociations. Those who are capable of working must promise not to beg again. If they do. they will be imprisoned for 14 days'. Ghamdi added.
Beggars generally operate near mosques, banks and of
But during the first days of Eid til Fitr. Saudi homes are swarmed by beggars demanding "Aidya. money that adults and the wealthy give to children and the poor.
Some, in order not to attract the attention of the police, dress in their Sunday-best clothes
These five star beggars ire qucnt luxury hotels chic restaurants or si lopping cen tres said Mohammed al Muayed a journalist with Saudi Arabia s Okaz newspaper