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THE SUPREME Court on Thursday gave its nod to reunite eight of the 44 minor inmates of the Muzaffarpur shelter home, which was at the centre of a sex abuse scandal, with their families.
A bench of Justices N V Ramana, M M Shantanagoudar and Ajay Rastogi also asked the Bihar government to provide financial and medical assistance to the girls who would be moved.
The direction came after the court perused a report by Tata Institute of Social Sciences’ (TISS) field action project ‘Koshish’. The report had identified these girls as fit for repatriation with their families.
The bench also asked TISS to file a status report with respect to the other 36 girls.
Read | Muzaffarpur shelter home abuse: How the system failed them
The Supreme Court asked the state government to assess the compensation payable under the victim compensation scheme to the affected girls and submit a report.
Appearing for TISS, Advocate Vrinda Grover submitted that the said 44 girls were housed in four shelter homes after the alleged abuse came to light.
While some girls who had extended families were ready to take them back, some had special needs.
One of the girls remembered only the locality where her family lived.
The scandal at the shelter home run by an NGO had come to light last year following a social audit report by TISS.