First the police handed over the girl to NGO Childline; the latter in turn tried to get her admitted to a nari niketan at Karnal. But the authorities there refused to take her, saying that there was no place.

For the past two days, the victim has been kept at the Gurgaon Childline centre and will probably have to spend longer time there.

“We cannot keep her here for long; we do not have the resources to deal with such cases. We act as an immediate emergency support structure for minor victims,” said Ravi Kumar, executive director of Shakti Vahini — the organisation running Gurgaon Childline centre.

A resident of Gopalganj in Bihar, the victim was married off to a 45-year-old man (one Pramod) as her father could not repay money he had borrowed, the victim has said. The marriage took place in Bihar on March 10, and she was brought to Rohtak a couple of months ago, the victim said.

“My husband does not like me. He used to come home drunk every evening and beat me up,” she said. On Thursday, Pramod took her out to show the city. “I thought he has changed.”

She was of course wrong — Pramod took her to Gurgaon bus station and then excused himself, the victim said. After waiting for his return for over an hour, she started looking for him.

“On inquiring, the rickshaw pullers around said the man with me had gone away. I could not believe it,” she said. She waited for another two hours before the rickshawpullers took her to the local police station. A case of missing child was registered and she was handed over to childline workers.

The counsellors at the centre spoke to her and found that she was a human trafficking victim and needed to be put at a place where she would get protection and care while investigations were carried out against her husband.

She was taken back to the police station to register a fresh case of trafficking, but the cops refused to do so.

City Police Station SHO said, “We cannot register the case because the crime was not committed here. She was sold in Bihar and the case has to be registered there.”

On Friday, she spent the whole day in courtroom. Childline workers appealed that she be sent to nariniketan in Karnal. But the SDM refused, stating, “There is no place in Nariniketan.”

While the NGO workers are trying to figure out the logistics and possible action to be taken against her absconding husband and her father, the girl is unsure of what the future holds for her. But she is sure that she does not want to go back home. “My father will not let me stay there. He had even tried to sell me off to an orchestra two years back,” she said.