Bhikhiwind, Punjab:
Unable to bear the cost of treatment, a septuagenarian mother has been forced to keep her two children in chain for the last 22 years at Baler village near Bhikhiwind, a small town in Amritsar district in Punjab.
The brother-sister duo - Gursahib Singh and Kuldeep Kaur, who are now in their thirties - have been living in a dinghy room at their house, with their hands and feet tied with iron chains, since they were eight years old. Their mother, Simranjit Kaur, says the siblings lost their mental balance at a very young age when they saw their father Amar Singh gunned down by militants in 1991.
She fears that they might hurt themselves or someone else in the house or in the neighbourhood if they are set free.
Gurmeet, one of the relatives, said, "I have been living with the family in the same house, but I always live in fear. I have quit a government job to stay with my children because they feel insecure in my absence."
Mrs Kaur had appealed to the government for financial help to bear the cost of their treatment. But there has been no change in her situation for the last two decades.