Indian police have reunited thousands of missing and trafficked children with their families using a new facial recognition app that campaigners said is a "game changer" in tackling the problem.

Tens of thousands of children go missing every year in India, and many are trafficked to work as beggars or in eateries, handicraft industries, factories or brothels.

Police in the southern state of Telangana developed the facial recognition tool as part of Operation Smile, a periodic drive to tackle child labor and missing children.