Trading in misery with women, children easy victims
NEW DELHI: It is a matter of great shame that even after half a century since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the international community, trafficking in women and children continues to thrive. The International Organization for Migration estimates that the global trafficking industry generates up to US$8 billion each year from what may be described as "trade in human misery".
There are many forms of trafficking. The most visible and widespread is the trafficking of women and children for commercial exploitation. The problem has now been exacerbated by globalization and its impact on the lucrative tourist and sex industries. Though it is a global phenomenon, the problem has assumed alarming dimensions in South Asia.
The term trafficking is used to describe activities that range from voluntary migration to the forcible displacement of people for exploitation. The UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Radhika Coomaraswamy, has correctly pointed out that at the core of any definition of trafficking, must lie the recognition that trafficking is never consensual.
It is this non-consensual nature of trafficking that distinguishes it from other forms of migrations. Thus all kinds of illegal migration are not trafficking.
Today South Asia has emerged alongside Southeast Asia as a major center for regional and international trafficking in women and children. Trafficking in women is done primarily for prostitution, but also for bonded labor, mendacity and smuggling.
Major international flows include trafficking in girls from Nepal and Bangladesh to India, from Bangladesh and Burma to Pakistan and from Pakistan and India to the Middle East. Further trafficking in young boys from India and Pakistan to the Middle East for use as camel jockeys has also assumed alarming proportions. Though there is a dearth of accurate data, the fact remains that the volume of trafficking in women and children in India is disproportionately high.
Women and children are used for prostitution, domestic work, camel jockeying, organ transplant, begging, drug-trafficking, forced marriages and adoptions and other exploitative forms of work. Both demand and supply factors ruthlessly drive the trafficking industry.
Some key push factors are inadequate employment opportunities, the lack of a social safety net, globalization, relaxed control and an open border facilitating the movement of populations.
Other important contributing factors are the erosion of traditional family values, of consumerism, traditional practices in some communities like dedicating girls to gods and goddesses. Further, social acceptance of prostitution in some communities encourages the clandestine trade.
Nepal today is the largest identifiable source of child prostitutes for Indian brothels. A UNICEF review indicates that 5,000 to 7,000 girls are brought to India every year. It mentioned that Nepali girls and young virgins sell for at least Rs 6,000 in Indian brothels on their first nights.
Virgins are prized because of the prevalent myth that sleeping with virgins will cure sexually transmitted diseases. Fear of AIDS has also raised the demand for virgins.
Traffickers manipulate Nepal's poor economic conditions to their advantage. The victims are offered jobs or lured by promises of marriage. Mumbai has the largest number of Nepalese girls in prostitution.
According to one estimate, there are about 20,000 Nepali women in the city's flesh trade. They were brought by local recruiters and then sold off to brokers who delivered them to brothel owners. Sixty percent of them contract HIV.
According to another survey, Bangladeshi girls and women constitute almost 11 percent of the total number of prostitutes in Kolkata. Difficult economic conditions in Bangladesh and the oppression and torture of girls by their husbands. Some of them have been abandoned by their husbands along with their children.
Article 23 of Part III of the Indian Constitution relates to fundamental rights, and under the heading "Rights Against Exploitation" prohibits trafficking in human beings. It says that any contravention of this right shall be an offense punishable by law. Articles 39(e) and (k) of the directive principles of State Policy under part IV of the Constitution declare that state policies should ensure that "childhood and youth are protected against exploitation and material abandonment".
Building on the constitutional principles, the Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls Act was enacted in 1956. The Act was amended in 1986 and ratified as the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act. The amended Act continues to prohibit prostitution in its commercialized form without making prostitution per se an offense.
The Act prescribes stringent action against those procuring children for prostitution. If the offense is committed against a child, the punishment is rigorous imprisonment for a term not less than seven years. Regrettably, enforcement of the Act has been extremely poor.
Cases of clandestine inter-state and cross-border trafficking in women and girls are seldom investigated. Consequently, the basic structure of the cruel and exploitative system continues to flourish. Section 13(4) of the Act empowers the central government to appoint trafficking police officers with nationwide jurisdiction for the investigation of cases of inter-state trafficking in women.
No step has so far been taken by the government to appoint "trafficking police officers". A central investigation agency, notably the Central Bureau of Investigation, should be directed by the government to depute "trafficking officers" as envisaged under the provisions of the Act.
Again under Section 13 of the Act the state governments are to appoint special police officers who should be assisted by an Advisory Body comprising leading social welfare workers of the area.
This, if done, will create a mechanism at the field level to initiate and sustain appropriate action. Indeed effective implementation of the provisions of the Immoral Traffic Prevention Act needs far greater police vigilance. It is police collusion which often enables traffickers to operate without fear and go scot-free.
There are major international standards which provide a framework within which countries can address the issue of trafficking. These are (1) The United Nations Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the exploitation of the prostitution of others, 1949.
The convention has been ratified by 71 countries (1997), but has not attracted widespread support. (2) The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) 1979. CEDAW obliges states to enact legislation to suppress all forms of traffic in women.
The convention has been ratified by 155 countries. (3) The United Nations Convention on the rights of the child 1989. It has near universal ratification and 189 states are parties to it.
Women and children in this case are often vulnerable to abuses of the legal system. In India, about four times as many women in the sex trade are arrested but procurers, guardians, pimps and clients are barely touched. Further the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS has undermined attempts to repatriate trafficked women or to rehabilitate them.
Though trafficking is undertaken on a large organized scale involving regional gangs who have links with law enforcement agencies, there is no proper regional mechanism to ensure cooperation and coordinated action.
-- The Statesman/Asia News Network