NEW DELHI: Expressing concern over the plight of mentally ill homeless people, particularly women, who are exploited with govt authorities not providing them care and shelter, Supreme Court on Monday asked Centre to come out with standard operating procedure (SOP) for law enforcement agencies to reach out and help them, reports Amit Anand Choudhary.A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta granted two weeks’ time to govt to place before it a draft SOP and turned down Centre’s plea for more time. It passed the order on a PIL filed by advocate Gaurav Bansal seeking the court’s intervention to protect the rights of homeless persons with psychosocial disabilities and to provide them shelter and medical treatment.“Homeless persons with psychosocial disability are highly vulnerable to abuse, violence and exploitation, and the absence of a dedicated mechanism to address their condition exposes them to gross human rights violations, contravening India’s obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Societal stigma and the absence of a uniform standard operating procedure for law enforcement agencies and mental health professionals, have led to arbitrary, ad hoc responses, wrongful confinement, and systemic neglect of homeless mentally ill individuals,” Bansal said in his petition.
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