Panaji, Dec 25 (TNN): Arz, a Vasco-based NGO has petitioned the national commission for protection of child rights, New Delhi, (NCPCR) to trace and unite an eight-year-old girl wrongly transferred to Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh with her mother in Vasco.

The girl was placed in protection home Apna Ghar at Merces but was transferred to a child welfare committee (CWC) in Gorakhpur on the orders of the CWC, South Goa, because her parents are from outside the state.

In its petition, ARZ alleged that the CWC, South Goa, has behaved in a very insensitive manner and against the child's best interest. The NGO wants the child to be united with her mother.

ARZ stepped in when the girl's mother Urmilla Manodar, a resident of Baina, approached them to find her minor daughter, who was lodged in Apna Ghar in November, 2012, by the Vasco police. The mother claims she is a single parent.

In November 2012, when her daughter was out alone, someone reported her to the police and she was placed in Apna Ghar. Arun Pandey of ARZ claimed that the girl has been wrongly transferred to Gorakhpur even as her mother made attempts to contact CWC. Yet she was not given custody of her child. A member of the CWC said that the NGO should have contacted them directly instead of petitioning the national commission. The member also claimed that the girl's mother had been uncooperative when they had conducted a hearing before the NCPCR.