Workshop to combat human trafficking

Kolkata, Feb 1(UNI) Just when human trafficking, more so in women and children, has turned into one of the fastest growing forms of criminal activity, next to drugs and weapons trade, generating 80 billion dollars annually, the Eastern Regional Workshop to combat human trafficking was organised here today.

The workshop was organised by the West Bengal Commission for Women, in association with the National Commission for Women, to discuss the draft plan of action to prevent and combat human trafficking with special focus on children and women.

In the two-day workshop, the existing legal framework to combat human trafficking would be discussed.

Speaking on the occasion, member of National Commission for Women Ms Malini Bhattacharya said the lack of specific and adequate legislation on trafficking at the national level was one of the major obstacles in the fight against trafficking.

Pointing out the loopholes of the current Immoral Traffic Prevention Act 1956(ITPA), she said that the law does not define ''trafficking '' in human beings.

Moreover, the prime objectives of the laws had been to prohibit women traffic for the purpose of the prostitution as an organised means of living but it does not focus on human trafficking for forced labour.

She added that even there was dearth of proper rehabilitation centres for the victims who were rescued by the police.

Professor Bhattacharya also said that poverty and unsafe migration of human forces as the main cause of human afficking.

Referring the recent report released by the Interpol, she said sex-trade was on rise due to the boom in the tourism industry which was exposing more children to sexual exploitation.

The Chairperson of the West Bengal Commission For Women Professor Jasodhara Bagchi said the available laws and acts should be harmonised so that the victims of trafficking were not treated as ''perpetrators''.

Justice Somaresh Banerjee, who inaugurated the workshop, discussed about the different Articles in our constitution to combat human trafficking.

UNI