India’s latest feral child- what her doctors say
Doctors say that they don’t believe that the girl who was found in the Motipur range of katarniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary in Uttar Pradesh was raised by monkeys. This was reported by the British newspaper, The Guardian on Saturday.
Sanctuary officials expressed suspicion that the girl was abandoned there by her relatives. This is contrary to the media reports that said the girl grew up in the wild with the animals. The officials also said that they think she is differently abled. They said that it’s likely her parents left her in the fort. They speculate that the relatives didn’t want to look after her anymore.
It’s said that the child’s condition is “still under investigation.”
Differently abled
“It is clear from first time view, if you see the girl, that she is only eight or nine years old, but her facial expressions show that she is disabled, not only mentally but also physically,” said JP Singh, district chief forestry officer. “I think the family members of this girl had been aware that she is not able to speak, and they may have abandoned her near the forest road,” he said.
As per Singh, the forest was under continuous CCTV camera surveillance. So, there’s no way that the girl could have lived there for long without getting spotted, “If she was living with monkeys it would have been for a few days only, not for a long time,” he said.
Once she was found by forest officials about two months back, she was moved to a district hospital in Bahraich. The chief medical officer, Dr.DK Singh of the hospital too is in compliance with the forestry officer’s view. “In India, people do not prefer a female child and she is mentally not sound,” he said. “So all the more [evidence] she was left there.”
According to the constable who found the girl, she was clothed and there weren’t any monkeys around when he saved her. “She was moving around on her haunches,” said Head Constable Sarvajeet Yadav. “She was wearing a frock and kachchha [knickers]. She was very weak and tried to move away on seeing us… There were no monkeys. She was not naked, and she wasn’t using her hands to walk. I don’t know how these stories are being spread.”
Image credits: timesofindia.indiatimes.com