Dindigul (Tamil Nadu) [India], May 27 : A police officer in the Dindigul district has been helping dropout students to enroll in schools again as they couldn't attend their schools due to pandemic-related hardships earlier.

Speaking to ANI, Assistant superintendent of police (ASP), Crime Prevention against Women and Children, SP Lavanya said that as education is a permanent asset to the students, a move has been taken to prevent them from getting into "crime, child marriage, and child labour".
"School dropouts increased due to the COVID pandemic and during the awareness program, we found that there are more numbers of school dropouts and on the basis of collected data, our women help desk called 'Friend' reached out to those families of students and counseled them," Lavanya said.

Calling the whole process a successful move, the ASP said it is not a one-time program but the women's help desk keeps continuing the follow-ups on this.
"This is not a one-time program but we also do a follow-up on this, if the students stop coming after some time, we visit families again and counsel them," she added.
"As of now we have sent around 200 students back to school, and we will ensure that every dropout will be sent back to school. The education department and district administration are helping us in this program," the police officer said.