Ahmedabad: Two HIV-positive boys have been forced to leave an orphanage in Gujarat after staff said they posed an unacceptable risk to the safety of other children, an official said on Friday.
"I am sad and sorry for them. Children play, eat and fight we cannot take chances, others can get infected," V Vachonidhi, secretary of an orphanage run by Arya Samaj said.
The two boys, aged six and nine, are now with relatives after leaving the home in the town Kutch, 450 km west of Ahmedabad, where they had lived for four years with about 150 other children.
Staff could not tell what had happened to their parents or how they had become infected with the HIV virus.
The Indian "network for people living with HIV" said it would launch a legal challenge.
Families often disown HIV-positive family members, and the children of HIV/AIDS patients have been thrown out of schools. Landlords have refused to rent houses to those infected.
India has the world's highest national HIV/AIDS caseload with 5.7 million infected people. Although it reported its first case over 20 years ago, many sufferers still face acute stigma due to a lack of awareness and misconceptions about the disease.
"We will make sure that the boys receive the best of medical treatment and a healthy upbringing," said Umashankar Pandey, who works to improve awareness of HIV/AIDS in the state.
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