New Delhi: Physical abuse by family members, mostly parents, has emerged as the foremost cause for children to run away from home, a study conducted on factors associated with the runaway behaviour has said.

Conducted at a Child Observation Home in Central Delhi, where Delhi Police brings street boys from all over the city, the study revealed that out of the 400 boys contacted, 89.2 per cent had run away from their homes to become street children while 9.2 per cent had been working on the street and had not run away from home.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) classification, street children consist of two major sub groups.

Children "on" the street are those who have not run away from home but mainly work on the street and return home at night or periodically while children "of" the street are ones who have run away from their homes and broken all family ties.

The most common reason cited for running away from home was beating by family members as reported by 123 children (34 per cent), the study conducted by researchers from the Maulana Azad Medical College said.

"Some of the children also showed healed wound marks which, they claimed, were the result of beating," the study published in the 'Indian Journal of Pediatrics' said.

The next common reason was the desire for economic independence (28.5 per cent), which is probably a reflection of the deprived families they belonged to as both the groups (children "of" the street and "on" the street) were from families that lacked basic amenities, it said.

The study said only 46 per cent of the boys had been living in masonry (pucca) houses, 54 per cent had a separate kitchen and only 31 per cent had own water tap.

"In many countries, the foundation for homelessness is recalcitrant poverty, which prevents the family from meeting the fundamental, developmental and nurturing needs of the young. Studies in India have also demonstrated the same," it said.

Interestingly, a higher percentage of runaway boys were from joint families. Perhaps the frustration of not rising up to the expectation of a literate father had a negative impact, as the literacy of the father was higher in the runaway group, the study said.

Also, a significantly higher proportion of "not runaways" had only the mother earning which reveals that they were just supporting their mothers.

Among the runaways, the age of leaving home varied from five years to 16 years with 58 per cent leaving home between 10-14 years of age.

"The reason may be that around puberty, children start ascertaining their identity. Also, the parents are more loving towards and less expectant of younger children and at around puberty the expectations begin to increase," the study said.

The other reasons that emerged for children running away included abandonment by parents (9.7 per cent), presence of stepparents (6.6 per cent) and both parents dead (6 per cent), in that order, the study said.

"Thus, the precipitating factors are physical and sexual abuse in the house, poverty, rejection and emotional insecurity," it said.

PTI