Another 100 elderly destitute shifted out of Kanchi hospice

Chennai: Around 100 more elderly destitute were shifted out of St Joseph’s hospice in Paleswaram village on Wednesday, as district officials grappled on how to pin the facility for various irregularities in the absence of a law governing institutions for the terminally ill.
Spread over 16 acres at Uthiramerur in Kancheepuram, the hospice has been scrutinised by teams from the health, revenue and social welfare departments since the last two weeks.The investigation was initiated after one of the home’s vans was found ferrying a corpse of an elderly man along with vegetables and two other senior citizens on February 20.
On Wednesday, while shifting out the remaining 100 of the 289 destitute people residing in the facility, officials found nine children housed on the same campus. They alerted the child welfare committee, which sent a member for inspection. “Our member tried to take the children away as housing them in such facilities is a violation of the Juvenile Justice Act,” said R N Manikandan, chairman of CWC, Kancheepuram. “The hospice staff stopped us,” he said.
The hospice, however, said the children had “legitimate reasons” to be on the campus. “Their parents work as staff for us. We ensure they have no contact with the dead or the dying,” said Father Thomas, the proprietor. The children, aged between two and nine years, clung on to their parents and refused to leave, he said.
The CWC has given the home time till Monday to present proof of the children’s parentage, following which they will take action, said Manikandan. The police have been talking to patients shifted out of the home to find if they were abused. “So far, none of them has reported abuse or come forward to lodge a complaint,” said Santhosh Hadimani, Kancheepuram Superintendent of Police.