Girl trafficking on rise

Kolkata, July 13 (UNI) Girl trafficking is spiralling in the world with the numbers rising from three million to 756 million per year in the last decade, according to official estimates.

The prime cause which compelled the people into the trade was poverty and poor socio-economic conditions, NGO Apne Aap, President, Ruchira Gupta said here today.

Another visible reason is the social stigma the rape victims have to face leaving them with the only choice to adopt the profession, she said.

Kusum was just six years old when she was sold by her mother for a paltry sum of Rs 150 to the owner of a brothel in Sonagachi, the biggest redlight area in West Bengal. Since then she has not seen the world outside.

Its not only girls like her but lakhs of women, girls and small boys aged six to 14 are trafficked every year from the country to place them into foced sex, bonded laboures, unsafe agricultural labour etc.

These women and girls are often lured into the trap through false marriage promises, clandestine employment like entertainment business as a result the girls fall prey into the most hated crime of prostitution.

According to official sources the number of trafficked women has increased from 3 million to 756 million per year in the last decade and the most visible reason is 'sex tourism' which has emerged as a most profitable business with little investment as the girls are sold for meagre amounts.

The women and girls are trafficked to various parts of the world basically into places like Bangkok, Pataya, Indonesia where prostitution has been legalised and the government earns crores of revenues from sex tourism and the state contributes to the largest figure with Murshidabad being the highest, she said.

In a meeting on the issue of 'Trafficking Women and Children' here, Ms Gupta said the only way to combat this social evil is by creating employment for the deprived women and to create awareness campaign on this global disease.

She also added that such trafficking is changing the demography of certain places where there are no females and some places having the largest number of female ratio. Stressing on health grounds, she said that most of these trafficked girls are HIV positive and are responsible in spreading the disease world wide as they cannot say no to unsafe and unprotected sex.

She further said internet is becoming the easiest mode of operating the racket and the whole process is run by some major mafias and narco-terrorists.

It has also been found that the racket operates on black money leading to inflation in the country.

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