CJI Stresses Urgency To Curb Human Trafficking

New Delhi, Nov 15 (UNI) Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan today stressed 'intensified action' to curb human trafficking-- especially of children and women-- for sexual, labour or organ exploitation.

''Every year,'' Justice Balakrishnan noted at a meet of law and enforcement professionals and experts ''millions of individuals are trafficked all over the world and... coerced into living conditions that amount to slavery, forced labour and servitude.'' ''There is of course an urgent need for intensified action to curb this menace,'' the Chief Justice emphasised.

The event was a Colloquium on Justice Delivery in Human Trafficking Crimes for Judicial Officers, Prosecutors and Police Officers co-organised by India's National Legal Services Authority and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

''Trafficking in persons is a multi-dimensional form of exploitation,'' a sponsor statement said. ''It makes human beings objects of financial transactions.'' Thousands of Indians have been disappearing year after year, speakers said as they shed some light on how such missing persons end up in brothels, forced labour, begging or as unwitting organ donors.

''The exploitation may be for many reasons - prostitution, other sexual exploitation, forced labour, begging, forced marriages, adoption (or) transplantation of human organs,'' the disappearances often follow ''use of force, duress or deception.'' Justice Balakrishnan released a Resource Book on the Legal Framework on Anti-Human Trafficking which collates legal provisions relating to domestic and cross-border trafficking.

The Book projects trafficking as an organised crime and takes a look at scores of Indian laws-- from Penal Code to Immoral Traffic and Juvenile Justice-- which could help tackle the problem.

It works with numerous laws such as the Citizenship Act 1955, Foreigners' Act 1946, Indian Passport (Entry Into India) Act 1920, Religious Institutions (Prevention of Misuse) Act 1988, Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act 1986 Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1976, and Transplantation of Human Organs Act 1994.

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