As 47,000 children remain untraced across India, the Supreme Court has directed police authorities to immediately register FIRs in cases of missing persons mandatorily incorporating the relevant Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita provision on kidnapping to ensure seriousness in investigation and avoid procedural delays and uncertainty.Expressing displeasure over the rise in the number of cases of missing children often at the behest of organised interstate trafficking syndicates, a Bench led by Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah ordered police chiefs of states and union territories to ensure that anti-human trafficking units were made fully functional in four weeks with adequate powers and infrastructure for effective enforcement.The Bench, which included Justice R Mahadevan, on Friday directed the Ministry of Home Affairs to establish an all-India grid connecting each police station in the country on one platform having a special portal dedicated to human trafficking, including missing children and women.It asked the MHA to integrate databases maintained by different organizations and facilitate real-time sharing of information between police authorities, Child Welfare Committees (CWCs), District Child Protection Units (DCPUs) and child care institutions.The Bench posted the matter for further hearing in August.While dealing with a case of a Tamil Nadu minor girl who went missing from Chennai on September 19, 2011, the Bench said, “It is a massive issue and nobody is realizing the seriousness of this matter. How can we close our eyes to this reality?”As the child could not be traced, the police filed a closure report treating the case as “undetectable.” Her father G Ganesh moved the Supreme Court after the Madras High Court in March 2025 refused to interfere with the closure of the case.The directions were based on suggestions made by a top court-appointed committee which said the moment a child/person was recovered, he or she would be taken for Aadhaar verification or making of Aadhaar card.The authorities concerned must take immediate steps to restore the child/person to their families after due verification without any delay, unless there were indications that the family itself was involved in trafficking or exploitation, it said , adding in such cases, the responsibility would shift to the State and Child Welfare Committees.