Rescued woman alms seeker gets new lease of life in Tirunelveli

Collector K.P. Karthikeyan transformed the life of a rescued woman beggar and her two children. He arranged for registration in MNREGP, issued a ration card, and provided free house and new clothes as a Deepavali gift. He also ensured the woman would no longer have to beg to feed her children.

Collector K.P. Karthikeyan, who recently released funds to pay the tuition fee of a below poverty line nursing student, has transformed the life of a rescued woman beggar along with her two children.

 After The Hindu recently carried a story on children being used for begging with a photo of a woman seeking alms in Palayamkottai while cuddling a baby, Dr. Karthikeyan instructed the officials to trace her. City Health Officer Saroja and District Child Protection Officer Arul Selvi swung into action and with the help of a voluntary organisation here spotted the 22-year-old woman at a village near Palayamkottai as she sought alms, along with her two sons aged 5 and 1, in front of a bakery at Palayamkottai on Monday.

 They took her and the children to Tirunelveli Corporation’s shelter for the homeless near Palaymkottai bus stand and served them milk, biscuits and food. When the woman, who was identified as K.. Karpagam of Alwaneri, narrated her ordeals, the officials were moved.

 “Since my husband, a drunkard manual labourer, doesn’t take care of the family and would only beat us black and blue, I started begging only to feed my two sons,” she told the officials and shared the phone number of her elder brother.

 After verifying the version of Ms. Karpagam with her elder brother, the officials asked him to bring the children’s birth certificates or Aadhaar card of the woman and the five-year-old boy to take them back to their home.

 When the officials informed the Collector about the progress of the case, Dr. Karthikeyan asked them to bring the mother with the children to his chamber. When he told her that using the children for begging was an offence, an inconsolably weeping Ms. Karpagam replied that she had to beg to feed her children due to unemployment.

 “Since I have neither a ration card nor a bank account, I am not allowed to work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Programme,” she said.