Ranchi: Fifty persons, most children and elderly who got separated from their families on the inaugural day of the Jagannath Rath Yatra Mela in Dhurwa on Thursday, were reunited with their near and dear ones due to the coordinated efforts of Ranchi police and district legal services authority (DLSA), officials said on Friday.Special teams were deployed across the sprawling fair ground to trace lost persons and prevent children from falling prey to traffickers or antisocial elements. Frequent public announcements about missing individuals were made throughout the day as officials worked to locate and restore separated family members.Officials said the initiative goes beyond reuniting families and is aimed at curbing child trafficking, a concern in Dhurwa and adjoining areas. The area has witnessed several incidents involving missing children in recent months. In Jan this year, two siblings aged 5 and 4 were kidnapped from Dhurwa and later rescued from Ramgarh. In another case, three children went missing from Hatia in June and were traced to Puri.A police officer overseeing the rescue operation said most of those recovered on Thursday were children and elderly. “People approached us with information about lost relatives, and we immediately initiated efforts to trace them,” he said.City SP Paras Rana said around 50 plain-clothed police personnel have been deployed across the fair. “One of their key responsibilities is to identify and verify the background of children found alone. We will ensure that missing children do not fall into the hands of antisocial elements,” he said.DLSA secretary Rakesh Roushan said they have also launched a legal awareness campaign at the fair. “We reached nearly 40,000 people on the first day. Around 50 para-legal volunteers are moving across the fairgrounds to trace lost persons and bring them to our help centre,” he said.Roushan added that DLSA was assisting the district administration in restoring missing persons to their families and preventing child trafficking.