Human trafficking

Behind UP Couple Forced to Sell Son for Rs 20,000, an Inescapable Microfinance Debt Trap

Between September and December 2023, Lakshmina and Haresh Patel borrowed loans totalling over Rs 2 lakh from five microfinance companies. They were already suffering from crippling poverty.

Dashawa (Uttar Pradesh): Lakshmina Patel and her husband Haresh sold their two-year-old son Raja to a couple for Rs 20,000 on September 5. The two lived in Bhedihari Tola of the Dashawa village of the Kushinagar district in Uttar Pradesh.

Lakshmina had been admitted to a hospital and had just given birth to a baby girl. The woman running the hospital asked for Rs 4,000 to discharge her. The couple did not have a single penny. Haresh requested the villagers for a loan but no one gave him any money. Helpless, he sold his son through a middleman.

“When my daughter was born, the hospital authorities said that we will be allowed to take her home only after we deposit Rs 4,000. We had to give away our son for Rs 20,000 and three days after that we deposited Rs 4,000 in the hospital. When I went to the hospital I did not have any money. We hardly had anything to eat and survived on water. No one understands the helplessness which forced us to give away the boy. After the boy was taken away, we did not light the stove out of grief and remained hungry,” Lakshmina tells The Wire.

As per media reports, a local policeman investigating the case allegedly threatened Haresh and extorted Rs 5,000 from him. The accused policeman is now under investigation. However, to The Wire, Haresh said that the constable did not take Rs 5,000 from him – contrary to the reports.

Lakshmina is exhausted. “When we were in need, no one came to support us. But now everyone is coming forward. Some women even tell us that we should have been ashamed of selling the child. ‘How could we do it?,’ they ask. We have no answer. There is no answer to the question. We are completely silent.”

The middleman who sold the child, the couple who bought the child and the woman who ran the hospital have all been arrested and sent to jail. The cases are registered under various sections for criminal conspiracy, cheating, taking hostage and human trafficking.

Meanwhile, it has also surfaced that the hospital was being run illegally and has now been sealed.

The hospital where Lakshmina gave birth.

Kushinagar district magistrate Umesh Mishra and SP Santosh Kumar Mishra visited Haresh’s house. Former MLA Ajay Kumar Lallu and the current BJP MLA Dr Asim Kumar also met him.

Citing the incident as ‘heartbreaking’, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi took to social media to express her concerns and question the efficacy of various government-run schemes. “Will selling of humans become the norm now to be able to survive in the country?” she asked.

The ordeal of Lakshmina and Haresh raises some serious questions: Why was a ration card not made for this family when they were struggling with hunger? Why was the Ayushman Bharat card with free treatment not issued to them? Why did Haresh have no work and why did he not have a MNREGS job card? Why were Lakshmina’s children not going to schools or Anganwadis? Why are poor people going to legal and illegal private hospitals instead of government hospitals? Is this just a matter of awareness or is it a failure of the government? While a family struggled for two meals a day, children cried out of hunger, why did no one in the society come forward to help?

Economic hardships

Haresh’s father Badri was a resident of Dhumnagar in West Champaran district of Bihar. He had four sons — Haresh, Awadhesh, Suresh and Dinesh. In search of work, Badri came to Dashawa village in Kushinagar district bordering Bihar. He spent his entire life working as a labourer here, but was unable to provide a better life for his sons.

All the four sons earn their livelihoods by working as labourers. Awadhesh and Suresh work in Panipat while Dinesh is a labourer in Rohtak. Out of the four, three brothers have straw houses. Only Dinesh has a two-room concrete house.

None of them own a piece of agricultural land. Badri had leased 12 kattha of land from the government, but was forced to sell it due to financial constraints.

Legally, leased land cannot be sold, but in Kushinagar district, there are frequent reports of the sale of leased land given to the poor by the government. Wealthy farmers take advantage of the poverty and debt of the lease holders and buy such land at cheap rates. Haresh’s mother lives with his younger brother.

Haresh’s house is in the fields. There is nothing in the thatched hut except a plank to lie on, a fan, a small gas stove and some clothes. There is a hand pump and a mud stove outside the house.

Haresh Patel’s house at a distance.

Near their hut, there is a tiny brick structure symbolising the dreams of Haresh and Lakshmina, who could not build a concrete house.

The 40-year-old Haresh worked as a daily wage labourer but he never earned enough to meet his family’s daily meal requirements. He kept slipping into debt. Currently, Haresh is under a debt of Rs 2 lakh lent by micro-finance companies. The amount of Rs 1.10 lakh he received under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) was also spent on paying the interest of this loan.

Also read: Gender-Responsive Budgeting: Still a Long Way to Go For India

Haresh worked as a labourer at a brick kiln in Kubersthan for two years. He used to make Rs 160 per day for carrying 1000 bricks. When he lost his job there, it became difficult to get work daily. Now, he manages to find work only for 10-15 days in a month, earning Rs 300-400 in daily wages.

Haresh got 10 kattha land on lease for farming two years ago. He took a loan for the purpose but farming also started to cost him heavily as he did not have money for fertilisers, seeds and water. Eventually, he was forced to abandon farming.

Five years ago he got Rs 1.10 lakh for PMAY, of which Rs 10,000 was spent as ‘commission’, presumably to administrative officials. With this money he was able to lay the foundation of only two columns. The remaining amount was used to repay loans, while Rs 60,000 was spent on Lakshmina’s medical treatment.

Haresh Patel’s house.

Microfinance debt trap

Haresh and Lakshmina have since been caught in a debt trap.

When Haresh left farming, Lakshmina came in contact with a group of women. Microfinance companies showed her the dream of making her life better with loans. Between September and December 2023, Lakshmina and Haresh borrowed loans totalling over Rs 2 lakh from five microfinance companies. They attempted to pay instalments of one loan with the money from another loan, but in a few months all the cash was exhausted and they did not even have the money to pay the instalment.

Utkarsh Small Finance Bank lent a loan of Rs 30,000 to Lakshmina on November 18, 2023, which was to be repaid in 24 months with 25% actual interest. An instalment of Rs 740 was to be paid every fortnight. The microfinance company charged Rs 354 as processing fee, Rs 1,104 as other fees and Rs 750 as insurance fee for this loan. After deduction of these charges, she got only Rs 28,896 in hand, whereas she had to pay Rs 3,892 in 24 months including interest.

Lakshmina and Haresh have not been able to deposit amount towards this loan after April 2024.

Pahal Financial Services Private Limited gave Lakshmina a loan of Rs 46,200 on December 13, 2023, on which she had to pay 26% interest. An amount of Rs 2,300 was deducted from this loan in the name of a consumer fee and Rs 1,373 in the name of insurance. Lakshmina had to pay an instalment of Rs 2,500 every month. She could not deposit any after March 2024.

Spandana Sphoorthi Financial gave a loan of 42,000 to Lakshmina on September 30, 2023, which was to be repaid in 28 months through a monthly instalment of Rs 2,240. In these 28 months, they had to pay interest of Rs 12,262. This microfinance company took Rs 1,260 as insurance and Rs 496 as processing fee. This loan has also not been paid after April 9, 2024.

Some of the loan papers.

Fusion Microfinance gave Lakshmina a loan of Rs 45,000 on October 19, 2023 for buying cattle, which she had to repay in 25 months. To repay it she had to pay Rs 2,150 per month. They could only pay five instalments of this loan until February 2024.

IIFL gave a loan of Rs 45,000 to Lakshmina on October 13, 2023 at an effective interest rate of 29.02%. This loan was to be paid in 52 instalments of Rs 1,110 per fortnight. Lakshmina had last deposited a monthly instalment on May 30, 2024. No instalments have been deposited after that.

The question arises as to why microfinance companies were giving loans to Lakshmina and Haresh, when anyone who visited their house could see their abject poverty. One microfinance company has stated Haresh’s annual income as Rs 3 lakh in its documents. If loan payments are not deposited, the borrowers are subjected to physical and mental harassment. The poor who are already financially destitute are being drained further.

In rural areas, the debt trap of microfinance companies is now firmly a death trap for the poor. Several incidents of death by suicide by people entangled in such webs of debt are coming to light. In December 2023, a woman trapped in microfinance debt died by suicide in Mishrauli village of Sevarhi area in Kushinagar district.

Haresh has not been able to make any payments towards his loans since May this year. The agents of microfinance companies have started pressuring him. What was only starvation earlier has by now turned into a severe crisis of mounting debt from which he has found no way out.

Resigned to their fate

Meanwhile, Lakshmina got pregnant. By the time of the child’s birth, the household’s financial condition had deteriorated. Poverty and debt forced the couple to sell their child.

From the way Haresh and Lakshmina spoke, it seemed to this reporter that they had resigned themselves to the fate of having to give away one of their children even before they left for the hospital. Haresh said that before his wife was admitted in the hospital, he had told a labourer who had come to visit his family in the village to find someone to take the child.

According to Haresh, when his wife began to experience labour pains, he rushed her to Khushi clinic situated at the village intersection on September 3. On September 4, Lakshmina gave birth to a daughter.

“Madam (the hospital’s director) told me to deposit Rs 4,000 and take the child home. When I told her that I did not have money, she told me to take the child when I have the amount. We asked for a loan from two people in the village. Earlier also, I had taken a loan from these people at an interest rate of Rs 5 per hundred. Both of them refused to lend any more money,”said Haresh.

Then, he contacted the person with whom he had discussed selling his son. The person reached the hospital in an auto with three women and two men. He asked them to pay Haresh Rs 20,000, from which Rs 4,000 he deposited at the hospital. Lakshmina and their daughter returned home.

After this, the group of people who came to buy the boy took Haresh and his son Raja to Tamkuhiraj tehsil, where adoption papers were made. According to Haresh, he put his thumb impression on the papers as he is illiterate and handed Raja over to them.

Also read: The Modi Government’s Narrative Building on Jobs Is Just Not Succeeding

“When I handed Raja to them, he was crying a lot and refused to leave my lap,” recalled Haresh, his voice choking. “He is two years and two months old now. He is unable to speak properly. He kept on crying. Our hearts were heavy as stone. We also cried the whole night. The stove was not lit and we did not eat a single morsel. Our daughter Chhoti and sons Jalandhar and Mahavir started asking us about Raja. We lied to them and said that he had gone to his maternal uncle’s house,” he added.

“The next day a policeman came to our house and took me to the police station,” Haresh said, adding, “There he asked me how and why we sold our son. I was detained for one and a half hours. He gave me a piece of paper and asked me to put a thumb impression on it, after which I was allowed to go home. In the evening, five or six policemen came to our house in a jeep and took me to the police station. At the police station, I was asked where the boy was sold. I said that the boy had been taken away by people from Samaur. Since I did not have the number of those people, I gave them the number of the man who had mediated in selling the boy. The police went to his house that night and took him along to Samaur. Everyone including the child was brought to the police station. The child was given medicines at the block. Then he was taken to the district hospital. From there he was taken to another place (Child Welfare Committee) where again a paper was made and my thumb impression was taken. After that my son and I were sent home in an ambulance.”

“I could not think straight,” Haresh said, summing up the whole ordeal.

‘Everything is zero here’

Haresh and Lakshmina have four children — Jalandhar (six years), Mahavir (three and half years) and Raja (two years and two months) and the fourth child was born on September 4. They have named her Preeti.

This is Lakshmina’s second marriage and Haresh’s third. Lakshmina’s first husband died of illness. She had two daughters and a son with him. Lakshmina sent her elder daughter to live with her mother. The son who is 12-years-old and the younger daughter who is eight-years-old live with Haresh and Lakshmina.

Haresh’s first marriage took place 15 years ago. He had a daughter from his first wife. According to Haresh, his first wife left him due to financial constraints and took their daughter with her. Since then, he has met her only once. Later, he came to know that his daughter had got married.

After his first wife left, a villager arranged his match with a woman living in the neighbouring Rajapakar village. She was living separately from her husband and had three children. This marriage lasted two years, after which the two separated.

Haresh and Lakshmina got married seven years ago. Both of them have spent their entire lives in abject poverty and hunger.

The couple is happy to reunite with Raja but the worry of such a situation repeating itself in the future is writ large on their faces.

“As soon as the police handed over Raja to me, he ran and clung to me,” said Haresh. “On returning home, he remained at Lakshmina’s side for hours.”

“We had no hope that we will ever meet our son again. All this has happened thanks to you people. Can you get our house built too? And get us some money? We have been unable to get land on lease or a ration card till now. I had requested Pradhan ji for a ration card many times but nobody listened. Till date, nobody has given us anything. Today, two bags have come from an Anganwadi containing porridge, oil and masala. A day before, 35 kg of ration came,” Haresh said.

The Dasahwa village is located near the Amwa embankment of the Badi Gandak river. It is made up of nine hamlets and the population is no more than 5,000. One of the residents, Ramanand Patel told this reporter, “Look at our condition. Everything is zero here.”

Translated from the Hindi original by Naushin Rehman.

PM Narendra Modi to Address Human Trafficking Issue During Russia Visit

Foreign secretary Vinay Kwatra has assured that all efforts are being made to ensure the return of Indian nationals as soon as possible. So far, ten Indians have been brought back home, he added.

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s upcoming visit to Moscow next week is expected to address the pressing issue of Indian nationals who were “misled” into serving in the Russian army, foreign secretary Vinay Kwatra said on Friday (July 5). The early discharge of these individuals will be a key topic of discussion during the prime minister’s visit, news agency Reuters reported.

In recent months, a disturbing trend has come to light, where numerous Indians have been deceived with promises of high-paying jobs or educational opportunities in Russia, only to be coerced into fighting against Ukraine. Indian police have arrested four individuals linked to a human trafficking network in connection with these cases in May. Despite repeated requests from Reuters, Moscow has not responded to comments on the matter.

The situation has resulted in the deaths of at least four Indian nationals, prompting the Indian government to call for an immediate end to such recruitment and the quick release of Indians fighting in the Russian army. It is estimated that between 30 and 40 Indian citizens may be currently serving in the Russian army, Kwatra said during a media briefing.

Further, the foreign secretary has assured that all efforts are being made to ensure the return of Indian nationals. “All efforts have been made that Indian nationals return as soon as possible,” Kawatra said, adding that so far, ten Indians have been brought back home.

India’s stance on the Russia-Ukraine conflict has been to advocate for an end to the conflict through dialogue and diplomacy, rather than condemning Russia outright. This approach is likely influenced by the close relationship between India and Russia that has spanned decades.

Other South Asian nations, such as Sri Lanka and Nepal, have also taken steps to prevent their citizens from being duped into joining the Russian army. Sri Lanka has tightened controls, and Nepal reported that several of its citizens have been illegally recruited, with many still missing.

“Trade remains imbalanced, which is a matter of priority in our discussions with the Russian side,” Kwatra was quoted as saying by Reuters while he added that India hopes to “correct” this by pushing exports across sectors including farm, technology, pharmaceuticals and services.

On questions related to Modi’s visit coinciding with the July 9-11 NATO summit in Washington, Kwatra said: “The bilateral visit this time is just a scheduling priority that we have undertaken and that’s what it is.”

Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Russia on July 8 and 9 will include talks with President Vladimir Putin. The visit will also cover other aspects of the India-Russia relationship, including regional and global issues of mutual interest.

Nepali Men in Russia, Tricked Into Ukraine Frontline Deployment, Appeal to India for Help

The men, believed to be near Donetsk, also complained that the Nepal government and embassy have been of no help to them.

New Delhi: In an exclusive video clip shared with The Wire on Sunday, four Nepali men near the Russia-Ukraine frontline appealed for help from India, saying they had been scammed by visa agents who lured them to Russia by telling them that they would be hired as helpers.

The four men seen in the video identified themselves as Sanjay, Ram, Santosh and Kumar Srestha. ‘When we came here, we were told to go to the frontline to fight in the war. We are facing a lot of problems here. Indian brothers who were with us are being rescued by their government,’ said Sanjay.

He went on to say that the Nepal government and embassy were not helping them, and they are now forced to appeal for help from the Indian government.

“We have big hopes from the Indian government that it wouldn’t disappoint us. Nepal and India have good relations. We want to ask for India’s help as it is powerful. The Nepal government is unable to help us. All of the Nepali men here want to go back home.’

He said that there were 30 men in his group, of which only five are left, and they are worried that they will be deployed to the frontline soon.

As per the Nepal government, over 400 Nepali men had gone to Russia and joined its army, lured by prospects of good salaries of about 300,000 Nepali rupees as ‘helpers’. Unofficial figures put that number at over a thousand.

In December last year, the Nepali police in Kathmandu cracked down on several travel agents and arrested 18 people on charges of human trafficking and forgery.

As per Nepal’s foreign ministry, 12 Nepali men have died in the Russian-Ukraine war, and about 100 went missing or injured in Russia.

The Chinese Mafia Are Running a Scam Factory in Myanmar

In KK Park, on the Myanmar-Thai border, those who refuse to scam face torture, starvation and even murder. DW investigates one of Asia’s most brutal scam compounds.

Aaron couldn’t believe his luck. An up-and-coming tech company in Thailand was offering him a dream job — a high salary, great benefits, and a way out of a bleak future in southern Africa.

“I was hoping to go and work overseas. And one day, I was approached,” Aaron said. “I thought everything was legit — until I got to Bangkok.”

At the airport, Aaron was given a warm welcome and ushered into a car with two other young men from eastern Africa.

“We were supposed to go to a hotel that is maybe 10 minutes away from the airport. But we drove in a different direction.”

The driver drove for nearly eight hours before arriving in the Thai border city of Mae Sot, where Aaron and his fellows were trafficked over the Moei River and into a war-torn part of Myanmar.

“There were people with guns,” he remembered. “They said we should get in the boat — and we crossed.”

Myanmar: Human trafficking hub

Aaron and his fellows were trafficked into a prison-like compound called KK Park. Here, thousands of people are forced into criminality — to scam people in the United States, Europe and China. The UN estimates that more than 100,000 people are being forced to work in scam centres in Myanmar.

DW’s investigative unit met with several survivors of the compound. They described widespread surveillance, torture and even weekly murders.

“We worked 17 hours a day, no complaints, no holidays, no rest,” said Lucas, a young man from western Africa. “And if we say we want to leave, they tell us that they will sell us or kill us.”

But who is behind this brutal operation?

Myanmar’s local enablers

We reviewed exclusive images taken from within the compound and spoke to several survivors who were held there. They all recognised the badges on the guards’ uniforms.

They are the insignia of the official Border Guard Force, a group of former rebels who stopped fighting the Myanmar junta a decade ago in exchange for free reign over their territories.

Their soldiers are present in KK Park. But the bosses of the operation are Chinese, according to several sources.

Tracing crypto to KK Park

We followed the money trail from several scammed victims to see where it leads. It took us to cryptocurrency wallets KK Park used to collect victims’ funds. From there, the funds were funneled to other wallets, which act like digital accounts and store cryptocurrencies.

One of those wallets was opened by Wang Yi Cheng, a Chinese businessman based in Thailand. He received tens of millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency from wallets used by KK Park.

Wang is part of a larger network of overseas Chinese business people that ultimately leads to a notorious Chinese mafia boss.

At the time Wang was receiving direct transfers from KK-managed wallets, he served as the vice president of the Thai-Asia Economic Exchange Association, an association in Bangkok promoting Chinese and Thai relations.

Thai-Asia shares its building with the Overseas Hongmen Culture Exchange Center, which was raided by police in 2023, along with another Hongmen centre in Bangkok, for operating illegally and serving as a front for Chinese organised crime.

The Chinese link

These organisations are closely linked to Wan Kuok Koi, alias Broken Tooth. He launched the World Hongmen History and Culture Association in 2018, an organisation that has since been sanctioned by the US for its involvement in organized crime.

But Wan’s Hongmen organisation also promotes Beijing’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a trillion-dollar infrastructure project meant to integrate China further into the global economy. It is also known as the New Silk Road.

“Wan Kuok Koi also has a quote that he uses fairly regularly: he says he used to fight for the cartels, and now he fights for the Chinese Communist Party,” Jason Tower, a leading expert on organised crime at the US Institute for Peace, told DW.

The area where KK Park was built is a target region of China’s BRI investments. Chinese government reports hailed development projects in the vicinity of KK Park as part of its BRI ambitions, though it later distanced itself from them following allegations of widespread fraud.

KK Park itself is not mentioned in official Chinese communications, nor did it hold groundbreaking ceremonies like other development projects in the area.

Instead, KK Park was purpose-built for scamming.

KK Park’s scamming operations trace back to a complex network of businesses and associations used by criminals to legitimise their crimes and launder millions in defrauded assets — and that network continues to expand from Southeast Asia to Africa, Europe and North America.

“We really see that these criminal networks are becoming more and more powerful, more and more influential, and more and more embedded in different countries around the world,” says Tower.

“And the efforts by law enforcement are only touching the tip of the iceberg.”

Aaron, Lucas and Laura’s names were changed for security purposes.

This article first appeared on DW. Read the original here.

Trafficked, Sold, Abused Then Rescued From Iraq: Punjabi Women Share Their Ordeal

Fake travel agents have become a booming business in Punjab, with woman ‘touts’ now trying to lure financially weaker women into the trafficking net.

Jalandhar: Manpreet Kaur was one of the many young women who was trafficked to Iraq by a nexus of fake travel agents with roots in Punjab’s Kapurthala and Jalandhar districts.

Manpreet, like many other women, had refused to work as a domestic worker without a salary and resisted the advances of the house owner and agents who used to come to ‘buy’ women.

Thankfully, Manpreet along with 15 others managed to return home from Iraq, following the timely efforts of AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sant Balbir Singh Seechewal and the Ministry of External Affairs. Manpreet and her friend Sandeep came back on November 20.

“While I was beaten, kicked in the stomach, and locked inside a washroom, a Nepali woman, who too was kept as a domestic worker, was dragged from the stairs, stripped naked and made to stand on the highway by the landlord. She was presented before the ‘agents,’ who had come to buy her,” she said.

In a hushed voice, Manpreet, who sustained internal injuries and was undergoing treatment at a relative’s house, said that nobody came forward to save that Nepali woman – neither the women in the house nor any passers-by. “We were terrified to the extent that even a slight glance from the men towards us would send shivers down our spine. Even now, when I recall those moments, I feel faint,” she said.

Their ordeal was not just confined to physical abuse; the Iraqi nationals allegedly used to harass them by not giving them anything to eat. “For days I would remain hungry. To top it all, they used to ask us to cut meat pieces, which was an extremely abhorrent task to do. They used to punish the women in weird ways,” she said while continuously thanking god for saving her life.

This year, around 60 women have been rescued by Sant Seechewal from the Gulf countries of Oman, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, bringing to the fore the thriving nexus of human traffickers and the failure of the police to set things right. Earlier, another AAP Rajya Sabha MP, Vikamjit Singh Sahney, had also rescued many Punjabi women stuck in the Gulf.

Usually, the women are promised jobs as domestic workers in hotels, malls and hospitals in the Gulf nations. However, the reality is that the moment they land in the Gulf, they are sold to some other agents, who either keep them as slaves or force them to join prostitution.

“I am a computer graduate but the travel agents trapped me too. The desire to overcome poverty and lead a better life pushed me towards this nexus,” Manpreet said.

Women share their ordeal

In a bid to avoid any immigration staff queries, the woman were first taken to Dubai. After making them wait for around eight hours at the Dubai airport, they were issued Iraq visas. The moment they landed in Iraq, their passports and mobile phones were allegedly snatched by the agents.

Notably, the travel agents also gave them job letters from a cleaning company in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq, so that the women were convinced that they had a valid work visa. “We were employed in one ‘Machak Company’, Sulaymaniyah where women from different countries like India, Nepal, Bangladesh and African countries were hired for menial jobs,” she said.

Another victim, Sandeep Kaur from Kapurthala district, said they realised why the travel agents did not send them directly to Iraq from India. “It was an hour-long flight from Dubai to Iraq, from where we were first taken to the Machak Company office, which gave us job letters. From there some men came to pick us up in cars and we were sent to different locations. Our nightmare started the moment we were employed as domestic workers,” Sandeep said.

Incidentally, the women travel agent through whom Sandeep reached Iraq was her relative. “Mandeep Kaur from Phagwara, Kapurthala district is a distant relative. She has been living in Iraq for two years. She used to call us from Iraq and share stories about her comfortable life. But once we landed in Iraq, she stopped responding,” Sandeep said.

Another woman, requesting anonymity, said they wanted to reach out to Mandeep for help but she just left them alone. “There were many woman who in the absence of timely assistance and lack of funds were trapped in the vicious circle of slavery and prostitution. We met some Nepali women who had been staying in Iraq for the last seven-eight years and their condition was miserable,” she said.

Fearing social stigma, the women decided not to lodge FIRs personally. Their cases were taken up by Sant Seechewal with senior police officials.

Women travel agents’ network on the rise in villages

The trend of women acting as touts or brokers is on the rise in Punjab, particularly in the NRI rich belt of Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Kapurthala and Nawanshahr districts. The agents are trapping women from financially weaker sections aged around 18 to 35 years in the villages and are allegedly responsible for pushing them into prostitution.

Mandeep Kaur, a resident of Phagwara town in Kapurthala district who is currently living in Iraq, was named by both Manpreet and Sandeep as the person who they were in contact with about moving to Iraq.

The woman also shared, “It is a gang of around 20 to 25 people led by Indians, Pakistanis and Iraqis in which Mandeep was from Phagwara, and three men were from Nawanshahr district, Kartarpur town in Jalandhar and Zira town in Ferozepur district respectively. While Mandeep lures woman with work visas in Iraq, her male counterparts decide where the women will actually go.”

The women said that initially, Mandeep lured them with a free work visa offer in Iraq but when finally their visa came, she demanded Rs 80,000. “We paid Rs 80,000 each plus another Rs 25,000,” they said.

Manpreet said that she carried an extra amount of Rs 6,000 for her personal expenses but Mandeep snatched that too. “The biggest shock came when the men in the house told us that they had bought us and we should pay them Rs 4 lakh, if we wanted to go home,” she said.

AAP MP raises issue in parliament

On December 6, Sant Seechewal raised this issue in parliament and demanded strict vigilance from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to track the nexus of fake travel agents and their touts, a majority of whom manage to flee because of tardy police investigations and out of court settlements.

In his speech, he said, “Women and girls are being taken to Gulf countries through travel agents and sold there. Through our efforts and with the support of the Indian Embassy, we have brought back to India around 60 women from Gulf countries who were trafficked there.”

“Travel agents are trapping very young women/girls from poor households and sending them on visitor visas to Gulf countries where they are being exploited. They are tricked into working in homes or in restaurants and falsely assured of salaries of Rs 35,000 to 40,000. Then, those women are made to sign an agreement written in Arabic language, which is being taken undue advantage of. It is a large group of people whose network is spread across different states of the country,” he said.

DGP Punjab orders probe, no headway yet

Taking note of these cases, Sant Seechewal met Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Gaurav Yadav in October and sought strict action against the culprits.

Talking to The Wire, Seechewal said that the DGP had assured him that he would appoint a committee headed by Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Jalandhar Range as nodal officer and Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Jalandhar and Kapurthala as members to investigate the case.

Two months after the constitution of the DIG-level committee, though, there does not appear to have been much movement. The Wire reached out to DIG Jalandhar Range S. Bhoopathi with a questionnaire but failed to get an response. The DIG had initially responded to text messages but later stopped doing so.

However, when contacted SSP Kapurthala Vatsala Gupta said, “The investigation is at a preliminary stage and as it is a sensitive case, we cannot reveal much. But there is no denying that the trend of women acting as travel agents or brokers as part of a big human trafficking racket is on the rise in Punjab. A major fault also lies on the part of people who apply for such visas, as despite widespread awareness campaigns, people do not tend to verify the details of the travel agents and then get stuck.”

Earlier, the Rajya Sabha MP said that he also handed over a list of some travel agents to expedite the investigation. “We are waiting for a police probe,” he added.

NRI affairs minister clueless

The Punjab NRI affairs minister Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal also failed to give an elaborate reply to most of the queries posed by The Wire. The minister said that he was aware of the magnitude of the problem and was working to break the nexus of fraud travel agents.

Apart from expressing deep concern over the flourishing fake travel agents’ nexus in the NRI rich belt of Jalandhar, Kapurthala, Nawanshahr and Hoshiarpur districts, the minister said, “I am aware how women travel agents walk around the villages and trap women from financially weak backgrounds with big dreams of work visa, job and good salary. We are tracking these cases and will make some headway soon.”

Dhaliwal also said that he had brought this matter to the notice of the Ministry of Home Affairs. “As the laws to track and punish human trafficking were the central government’s domain, we have raised this issue with the MHA too,” he added.

Names changed to protect victims’ anonymity.

‘Drank Water From the Toilet’: Promised Visa to Italy, 17 Indian Men Abused, Sold Off in Libya

AAP Rajya Sabha MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney and his team have been credited with the men’s safe return back to India. One young man reportedly died by suicide to escape the mafia in Libya.

Jalandhar: For Ravinder Kumar and his family, February 6, 2023 was an extremely happy day. Three men from the family – Ravinder’s son, brother and brother-in-law – left for Italy, looking for work and a salary in euros, which in Indian currency would have easily converted into Rs 1 lakh per month.

But what the Dera Bassi-based family from Mohali district never knew was that their men, along with 14 others from Punjab and Haryana, would remain trapped in Libya for six months instead of ever making it to Italy. Ravinder’s family had paid a whopping sum of Rs 49 lakh to Madan Lal, a Haryana-based travel agent in Pehowa, who was their family friend.

When they realised the fraud, the family got an FIR under Sections 406, 420 and 120B of the IPC and Section 13 of the Punjab Travel Professionals Regulation (PTPR) Act registered against Madan Lal and his two female accomplices.

While Ravinder’s younger brother Sandeep (30) and brother-in-law Dharamveer returned home on August 20 after facing a nightmare in Libya, his son Tony (21) reportedly died after he jumped from the window of a fourth-floor building to escape a raid by the mafia.

The men aged between 20 and 35 years finally reached Delhi on August 20, 2023, following the efforts of Aam Admi Party (AAP) Rajya Sabha MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney. Back in Libya, they had been imprisoned in Zuwara and Tajoura detention centres, besides being sold off multiple times by ‘donkers’ (human traffickers).

In Libya, the men were robbed of their belongings, including passports, mobile phones, cash, luggage and clothes. They did not even have shoes to wear. The Indian Embassy officials got us chappals to wear, they told The Wire.

Helpless family, awaiting son’s body

Talking to The Wire from Dera Bassi in Mohali district, Ravinder broke down when he said that his brother and brother-in-law came back safely, but his only son died in a bid to flee from the mafia’s raids.

“Asi ta pehla hi mare si, hor maarte (We were already dead due to life’s struggles; this tragedy has ruined us forever). I was told that my son died in the month of May, when he was trying to save himself from the mafia’s raid in Libya,” he said.

For two months, Ravinder had no idea that his son was no more. It was only after the travel agent reached his village and informed the panchayat that he learnt about the tragedy. “I spoke to my son on May 6. That was the last time I ever heard from him. He would tell me that the donkers were beating and torturing him. We immediately approached Madan Lal to bring my son back but he did not do anything. I am helpless and find it hard to believe that my son met such a fate,” he said.

Tony’s body is still in Libya and the AAP MP is trying to bring it back at the earliest. “We sold off our only source of income – half an acre of agricultural land – for around Rs 16 lakh and raised the rest of the amount on loans to send the three of them to Italy. We spent Rs 13 lakh per person and sent another Rs 2 lakh to a Pakistani donker to free them,” Ravinder said.

AAP Rajya Sabha MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney along with 17 men who were rescued from Libya at IGI Airport, Delhi. Photo: Special arrangement

Ravinder’s brother Sandeep shared how the men were forced to drink water from the toilet and faced atrocious treatment at the hands of multiple donkers. “We had no idea where we were being taken. It was only after we landed in Libya that we realised that we had been duped. It was terribly hot in Libya. We were mostly given non-vegetarian food to eat and at times macaroni. The donkers would beat us, demanding 5,000 to 15,000 Libyan dinars from us, which meant Rs 13 to 40 lakh in Indian currency,” he said.

Sandeep said that he was doubtful about whether his nephew had died in the way they were told, as he never wore gold earrings in his ears, a tradition in many north Indian families. “I was separated from my nephew by the donkers. Though we remained in touch with each other for some days, later we were informed about this tragedy. My nephew never wore gold earrings but, in the photographs [of the body], we noticed the gold earrings. We have not received any call from the Indian Embassy in this regard and hope that he was lodged in the jail,” he said, praying that the body is not his nephew’s.

Donkey route to Italy via Libya

The story of the 17 men stuck in Libya once again brought to the fore the endless tales of human trafficking from Punjab and Haryana to Europe.

Libya is a major transit point for human trafficking, mostly to European countries. “Within days, we were prisoners being treated like animals without any identity,” said Sandeep Kumar.

It was perhaps for this reason that the donkey route to Italy was from Amritsar to Dubai and then Egypt. From Egypt the men landed in the captivity of an armed mafia in Zuwara city of Libya. During their six-month stay, the men primarily remained in three cities – Benghazi, Zuwara and Tawergha.

Notably, till last year, the fake travel agents or the donkers used to take people to Italy via Serbia via the sea route, where Indians were allowed visa-free entry and a month-long stay.

However, following reports of rampant human trafficking, Serbia banned the visa-free entry of Indians from January 1, 2023. The donkers, in a bid to chalk out another illegal route, were now opting for Dubai and some other Middle Eastern countries as the transit point to reach Italy.

Clueless Haryana based victims narrate ordeal

Haryana-based victim Anmol Singh’s (21) widowed mother sold her house in Jalandhar, some gold and took money on loan to send her only son to Italy. At present, she is staying with her two married daughters in Pehowa, Haryana.

Anmol’s sister Ramandeep Kaur told The Wire that her brother is depressed and is suffering from typhoid. “He is undergoing treatment and the doctors have advised him to take rest. He has turned fragile and is not in a condition to say anything. We are indebted to AAP MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney for bringing the men back. For us it was like a rebirth,” she said.

Ramandeep, a teacher, said that she met local MLA Sandeep Singh, Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and home minister Anil Vij and got an FIR registered against Madal Lal at Pehowa police station. “We want to request the Haryana government and MP Vikramjit Sahney to help us get back our money from the travel agent,” she added.

Answering a question on how they knew the travel agent, Ramandeep said, “We had heard about his work a lot and he lives close to our house. There was every reason to believe him.”

Similar was the story of Ankur (22), a resident of Baram village in Kurukshetra district, Haryana. Ankur’s paternal uncle Satvir Malik was the one who helped him go to Italy. “We thought that this would help bring Ankur’s family out of poverty. Ankur’s father died some years ago and his mother and two sisters were dependent on him,” Malik said.

Malik said that the travel agent never mentioned Libya. “We were shocked to hear that the men were stranded in Libya. He had informed us that the men would be taken to Dubai from Amritsar, where they would stay for around a week and from there, they would get the work visa for Italy. Nobody had any idea that we were badly duped,” he said.

The rescued men reunite with their families after their ordeal. Photo: Special arrangement

The scale of fraud and financial loss could be gauged from the fact that apart from paying Rs 13 lakh to send Ankur to Italy, his uncle again sent Rs 10 lakh to a donker and the payment was made via Dubai. “We took a loan and borrowed some amount from a local arthiya (commission agent) to send Ankur to Italy. Hamare bache ki jaan bach gayi (Our son’s life was saved),” he said, thanking god and MP Vikramjit Sahney.

Back in Punjab, the story of Gulpreet Singh from Bhogpur town in Jalandhar district was nothing short of a twist of fate. “My cousin was on a work visa in Jordon, also near Libya. As far as I know, he along with two of his friends decided to move to Libya to join this group, which was heading to Italy. And he got trapped too. Thankfully, he came back alive. Given the situation he was stuck in, it is indeed a miracle that he was safe and fine,” said his cousin Ankur Kumar from Patiala.

AAP Rajya Sabha MP led the rescue operation

AAP Rajya Sabha MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney, who led the rescue operation and facilitated the repatriation, said that he received a panic call from the men on May 28 informing him of their ordeal. “We even spoke to them on video calls in which we could see that they were living in unimaginably bad conditions, without proper food and water facilities,” he said.

Sahney said that since India does not have any diplomatic mission in Libya, they were helpless. “As the men were in distress, we immediately intervened and booked a hotel for them. We arranged two taxis for them, so that they could run from the captivity of the mafia and get rescued. On June 13, we initiated the rescue operation and successfully rescued the young men. That night, I and my staff remained constantly in touch with them till they reached the hotel,” he said.

The MP further shared that even the rescue operation was a roller coaster ride. Two days after the men reached the hotel, its owner duped them and informed the Libyan Police of their stay. The men were sent to a jail in Tripoli, Libya’s capital.

Later, the MP requested the nearest Indian Embassy which was in Tunisia to intervene in the matter. The Indian Embassy in Tunisia contacted the United Nations to release the men from the Libyan jail on humanitarian grounds and repatriate them to India.

“After weeks of correspondence and persistent requests at many levels from our side, on July 30, the Indian High Commission, Tunisia was able to get counsellor access through the United Nations and the men were released from the jail. They were sent to the Port of Illegal Immigrants in Tripoli, Libya. Then finally on August 19, all the paperwork and other formalities were completed and the men boarded a flight to Delhi,” Sahney shared.

The MP said that he was focusing on the legal action to be taken against the unscrupulous agents who duped these men, and on bringing back four others who were still stuck in Libya. “I am in constant touch with the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Punjab Police against Human Trafficking and officials of Haryana and Delhi Police, to ensure that the guilty are booked and strict action is taken against them,” he added.

The Greece Boat Tragedy and the Role of Pakistani Politicians’ Nexus With Smugglers

Although Pakistan is part of international anti-human trafficking protocols and has tasked its Federal Investigation Agency with cracking down on smugglers, enforcement is stymied by a smuggler-government nexus.

On the evening of June 14, Muhammad Gulfam was at home in a rural mountain village in northern Pakistan when he received a call from his cousin about a migrant boat that had capsized that day off the coast of Greece.

His younger brother, Aakash Gulzar, had been on board. Jobless, and without many prospects in cash-strapped Pakistan, 21-year-old Gulzar had made up his mind that he would pay smugglers to embark on a monthslong journey across thousands of miles through arduous land and sea routes to Italy.

The journey was not cheap, and Gulzar’s family had cobbled together €7,000 ($7,640) to pay a trafficking agent to smuggle him to Europe, where they hoped he would find a better life.

Late one afternoon in March, Gulzar hugged his mother and brothers goodbye and set off.

“We don’t want it to be the final goodbye, we want to see him again and we hope he is one of the injured in the hospital,” Gulfam told DW.

Naseem Begum, Gulzar’s mother, said she had spoken to her son on the phone before he boarded the overloaded vessel.

“My son requested prayers on the phone call and said ‘I will call you after reaching my destination’,” Begum told DW.

Pakistan’s migration problem

Witness accounts described the vessel carrying Gulzar as a 30-metre (100-foot)-long fishing boat that was crammed with over 700 people. It had departed from Libya and sank 50 miles (80.5 kilometres) off the coast of Pylos, a small Greek coastal town on the Ionian Sea.

Gulzar is still missing and presumed dead. Begum has sent DNA samples to aid in identification of her son’s remains, if they are found.

According to Pakistan’s interior ministry, 350 of those on board were Pakistani citizens. They are among the thousands of people fleeing an economic crisis in the South Asian country that has left many people without hope.

According to data from Frontex, the European Union’s border and coast guard agency, a record number of nearly 5,000 Pakistanis were detected on the ‘central Mediterranean route’ into Europe in the first five months of 2023.

Also Read: Debt Default Now Hangs Over Pakistan Like the Sword of Damocles

“We know that it is a combination of a lack of decent work and a general disillusionment about the future of the country which pushes young Pakistanis to use dangerous and illegal migration as a means to a better life. The victims on that boat must have been aware of the risks they were taking,” said Imran Khan, country director for Pakistan at the United States Institute of Peace, a US federal agency.

The victims “could be alive today if there were better employment opportunities, economic security and political stability in Pakistan”, he told DW.

In a village near Gulzar’s home in northern Pakistan, a local district official, Sardar Mushtaq Ahmad, told DW that 24 young men from the area were reported missing after the boat accident. Relatives have provided DNA samples to aid in the identification of recovered bodies.

Among the missing is 31-year-old Sajid Yousaf, who was running a crockery shop in the local market but failed to make ends meet. Yousaf’s two brothers already settled in Italy, one of them having taken the same route across the Mediterranean.

“We paid €7,100 to the smuggling agent to send Sajid to Italy where two of my sons are already living and earning well,” Muhammad Yousaf, Sajid’s father, told DW.

Osama Malik, a Pakistani immigration and refugee law expert, told DW that there are multiple push and pull factors that drive people to risk their lives for a chance to reach Europe.

Pakistani people line up to receive relief items in September 2022 following floods that devastated the country. Photo: Flickr/ EU Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid. CC BY-2.0.

“The rapid depreciation of the already weak Pakistani rupee against foreign currencies over the past 18 months has probably been a huge factor,” he said, adding that political and economic uncertainty has led to “desperation” among young Pakistanis.

“Most young men, and now increasingly women, are willing to invest their savings, borrow money and risk their lives just to get out of the country to what they perceive as greener pastures,” Malik said.

How do traffickers in Pakistan operate?

Approximately 90% of the Pakistanis who arrived in Italy in recent years have used a human smuggler, according to a 2022 survey by the Mixed Migration Centre, a Europe-based migrant research group.

Smugglers and middlemen work by canvassing poor towns and villages and promising youth a bright future in Europe in exchange for a lump sum of €6,000 to €10,000, which is paid to “bosses” living in European destination countries.

Gulzar and Yousaf’s families told DW that they dealt with several local “trafficking agents” and paid a boss living in Italy for the journey.

One of these “agents” told DW under condition of anonymity that the market for smuggling has increased as Pakistan’s economy has deteriorated, and foreign currency grows in value against the Pakistani rupee.

Also Read: With the Pakistan State in Paralysis, Millions of Pakistanis Struggle To Put Food on Table

“Those wishing to flee Europe are aware of the hardship, life-threatening risks and dangers but they neglect those risks and opt for the voyages,” he said.

Pakistan cracks down on human trafficking

As the number of migrants continues to increase, Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency has been tasked by the government with cracking down on smugglers and agents, particularly in the wake of the tragedy.

“We have arrested 27 human smugglers across the country and 70 cases have been registered against those smugglers,” spokesperson Abdul Ghafoor told DW.

Pakistan has signed on to international protocols to prevent human trafficking, and in 2018, passed the Prevention of Trafficking in Persons Act, but this has failed to put a dent in international human trafficking organisations.

“While legislation has improved over the years, its implementation is abysmal and needs to be improved if Pakistan is to counter the trafficking of citizens,” said immigration expert Malik.

He said the few prosecutions have only netted small middlemen, while allegedly complicit government officials and trafficking bosses are left untouched.

“It is the foot soldiers of the human trafficking mafia who are occasionally arrested, but convictions are rare even in these cases. The human trafficking cartels are known to have very strong links with certain influential political families in central Punjab, and also have links with the military and bureaucracy,” he said.

“The main solution to this problem is for Pakistan to improve its governance, adherence to rule of law and lift the economy so that young people do not feel the need to take such risks to escape,” he added.

This article first appeared on DW.

‘Held Captive, Pushed Into Prostitution’: Chilling Accounts of Punjabi Women Rescued From the Gulf

A new trend has emerged where women travel agents are luring financially weak women from villages to send them to the Gulf nations as domestic workers-cum-caretakers.

Jalandhar (Punjab): On May 20, when Paramjit Rani* boarded the Muscat-New Delhi-Amritsar flight, it was the most precious moment of her life. She was finally escaping from the clutches of her Arab owners in Muscat, where she was held captive and was allegedly forced to indulge in sexual activities.

Paramjit returned to India within two months of her stay in Muscat. She was on a 12-day tourist visa trip. She was working as a caretaker-cum-domestic maid at a hospital in Muscat at a salary of Rs 30,000 per month.

She went to Muscat on March 16 and returned on May 20.

While in most cases, travel agents dupe gullible people, in Paramjit’s case, her husband’s maternal aunt conned her.

The aunt, who belongs to Jalandhar’s Raowali village, with the help of some Kerala and Sri Lanka-based travel agents, had been sending women to Muscat as domestic workers for the past few years, Paramjit told The Wire.

In the last few days, many women have been rescued safely from Muscat with the help of Aam Aadmi Party MP Vikramjit Singh Sahney and renowned environmentalist and MP Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal.

As part of their rescue mission, they reached out to the Indian Embassy in Oman and also bought tickets for the women stuck in Muscat.

A special investigation team of Punjab Police has been probing the nexus of fake travel agents and middlemen in these cases.

Paramjit was initially reluctant to narrate her story, but while talking to The Wire, she said that there were around 30 to 35 more women who were also stuck in Muscat and were allegedly forced to indulge in sexual activities.

“I am extremely thankful to MP Seechewal for bailing me out of this crisis. There were moments when I felt that my life will end in Muscat and I will never be able to see my daughter and husband again,” she said.

She along with other women aged 20 to 40 years were initially held captive in flats for 12 days. “We were given work for only two to three days a week. Our passports and mobile phones were also taken by our owners. We were allowed to speak to our families for just one hour on Fridays, that too in the presence of our owners,” she said, adding that some of the owners could understand the Hindi language.

“After being given some work at the house of an Arab family, I was being pushed to indulge in immoral [sexual] activities. I still shudder at the mere thought of how I saved myself and spent every single moment in Muscat,” she said while crying.

Luckily, Paramjit managed to speak to her husband over the phone in the washroom. She narrated her ordeal to her husband and also sent a video to the Punjab government, pleading for assistance, which helped in bringing her back from Muscat.

Her husband, Hardeep Singh, told The Wire that when he approached his maternal aunt to bring his wife back to India, she demanded Rs 3 lakh for the same. “We believed her blindly, as she was my maternal aunt. But she treated us like any other customer. She used to get a commission for sending women to Muscat,” he said.

Another Jalandhar-based woman, who, too, was forced to indulge in sexual activities, reached home in mid-May. “She, too, was promised a job as a domestic worker but was pushed into prostitution. Because of the trauma, she decided to lead a secluded life,” said Paramjit, who knew the woman in Muscat.

She further said, “I am not educated and I fell into this trap,” indicating that she wasn’t aware of the news reports warning women to be wary of fake travel agents when moving to the Gulf.

Also read: Rampant and Unchecked, Punjab’s Fake Travel Agencies Are Fronts of Human Trafficking

The human trafficking nexus

When AAP MP Sahney’s team visited Muscat twice in May this year, they found that other than Punjab, travel agents from Kerala and Hyderabad were also involved in this nexus. “Earlier, only men were involved in this nexus, but now women travel agents have also become a part of it. In some cases, the relatives of the victims are the culprits, so the trust factor exists [in such cases],” the MP said.

Sahney, who is also the international president of the World Punjabi Organisation, said that till now, they have identified 36 Punjabi women, who were stuck in Muscat, out of which 24 were safely brought back to India. “Besides the Indian Embassy officials, a shelter home set up by a gurdwara in Oman was also helping the women who wanted to return to India,” he said.

“As per law, no single woman can travel to Muscat for work. The women should have a sponsor. As soon as the one-month long tourist visa validity expires, the women were supposed to pay a fine of 10 Rial per day, which is why the sponsors seek a hefty amount as fine to release them. The sponsors also seize the passports of the women, leaving them with no scope to come back. Once found staying illegally, it becomes the sponsor’s choice whether to release the women or not,” the MP’s team shared.

Other stories

There are many similar stories of Indian women being sold off to Arab families in the Gulf countries.

Twenty-year-old girl Analjit Kaur* from Rattakhera Punjab Singhwala village in the Ferozpur district was able to manage her escape before being sold off to some Arab men. She came back to India within 12 days in April.

“I was not aware of anything but I realised that something was amiss, when my owner, an Arabic woman, started forcing me to wear make-up daily. She forced me to wear a hijab, and apply make-up. She also clicked my photos, and recorded my videos. She kept telling me that I will become very rich. To my horror she passed on my videos and photos to some Arabic men, to whom I was sold off. I resisted her move but I was helpless and had nowhere to go,” she said.

Analjit said that when she learnt about the intentions of the woman, she immediately called her family. “Luckily, I had my mobile phone with me and first reached out to our village sarpanch Rajpal Sandhu through Instagram. Besides our sarpanch, I also remained in touch with one of my cousins, who was on a work visa in Muscat.”

In Analjit’s case, too, it was one of her distant relatives, a Muscat-based woman, who led her into this situation. The woman had been working in Muscat for the last eight months.

“It was my paternal aunt who introduced me to a Hyderabad-based travel agent. Before sending me to Muscat, the agent invited me to his house in Hyderabad and made me work as a maid for around a fortnight. Later, I got my tourist visa for Muscat,” she said.

She managed to escape when she got out of the bungalow to throw garbage. “My cousin had already reached my location in Oman’s Sur city from where I ran away. It was only after I escaped that I learnt that the area where I was residing was notorious for selling women,” she said.

In a choked voice, she said, “Meri izzat bhi bach gayi, te jaan bhi bach gyi (I was able to save my honour and my life, too). God has given me a second life.”

Also read: Trafficked, Exploited, Ransomed – Indian Workers in the Gulf Face New Test

Another girl, Rupa*, from Kapurthala district, who was also sold off, became a soft target for her travel agent because of her financially weak background.

Rupa’s father, Sadhu Singh, had approached Seechewal to rescue his daughter.

“My daughter had gone to Muscat in March to work as a domestic worker but was sold off by the agent as soon as she landed there. She was invited to Muscat by one of her cousins, who promised her a well-paying job. We needed money badly because of the financial constraints back home,” he said.

She returned home after a month in April. She was kept locked in a room for several days while her passport was taken away by her agent. She was not even given any food because of which she fell ill and had to be hospitalised. “Despite being sick, my daughter was forced to work,” said Singh.

The number of cases where women were sent to countries such as Oman, Dubai, and Qatar as domestic workers-cum-caretakers has increased over the last few years.

Earlier, only men from Punjab’s Doaba belt used to go to the Gulf countries with well-paying jobs as workers in the construction, and oil and steel companies.

Talking to The Wire, Seechewal said that since April, he has brought seven women back from the Gulf countries. “While six girls were stuck in Muscat, one was trapped in Saudi Arabia. As some of the cases were delayed, we were maintaining liaison with the Embassy of the Sultanate of Oman,” he added.

He has written over 32 applications to the external affairs minister, saying that the fake travel agents and their middlemen were targeting poor women in villages. These women were not well-educated and lacked any knowledge on living abroad. “With inflation at its peak, the trend of women moving to the Gulf as domestic workers and caretakers saw an increase in Punjab,” he added.

He also spoke about how these women were mentally and physically harassed in these countries.

“Once in the Middle East [or West Asia], these women are bound by a contract. Their owners get a two-year contract signed, under which, if they leave their work before the contract period, they are supposed to pay Rs 2.50 lakh, making things even worse for them,” he told The Wire.

There are other volunteers also who have helped in rescuing women from the Gulf countries and brought them back to India.

Preventing cases of human trafficking

Dubai-based philanthropist S.P.S. Oberoi, who runs Sarbat Da Bhala Trust, a charitable trust, has helped many women stuck in West Asia.

He said that the trend of women going to the Gulf nations as domestic workers started to increase around 2017.

If more than 70 women were coming back from the Gulf within a month, then around 100 were leaving for the Gulf countries as well. “In the last two months, I brought back four girls from Muscat after paying around Rs 2 lakh to Rs 3 lakh each to their sponsors. Every week girls are being brought back from the Gulf,” he said.

In the year 2019, Oberoi had brought back 104 women from Muscat. Last year, he brought back 15 women from Muscat, which included 12 from Punjab, two from West Bengal, and one from Bihar.

Recently, the philanthropist also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and external affairs minister S. Jaishankar to formulate a policy to stop the fake travel agents’ nexus. “I am glad that recently the Amritsar airport has set up a separate immigration desk, where passengers were being questioned for their visits. If the same concept is replicated in other airports, too, it will help in preventing cases of human trafficking to a large extent,” he said.

The root cause of the issue: the Kafala system

According to Balli Bahadur from Central University, Bathinda, who did his research on ‘Emigration of the Punjabi Dalits to the Middle East’ said the root cause of the issue is the Kafala system, which is the reason behind the exploitation of workers in the Gulf.

Under the Kafala system, a foreigner is not allowed to work in any of the Gulf countries without the local responsibility of the kafil (sponsor). The system requires that the emigrant works only for the sponsor and in some cases, they even keep the passport of the emigrant.

“The Kafala system is the root cause of this exploitation. It came into existence in 1975, when the Gulf Cooperation Council countries opened its doors for foreign workers following the oil boom. A majority of workers emigrate to the Gulf countries through the Kafala system, whereby an emigrant is sponsored by an employer who assumes full economic and legal responsibility for the employee during the contract period,” he said.

However, when it comes to women, the story is entirely different. “In some gulf countries, women are [reportedly] not allowed to speak up against sexual harassment cases. This is the reason why such cases are common and go unnoticed in these countries,” he claimed.

*The names of the women have been changed to protect their identity.

How Bicycle Campaigners Are Taking on Child Trafficking in Rural Bihar

Twenty-year-old Shahbaz was trafficked for work as a child. Now, he visits at least five villages on a bicycle, to spread awareness on the sensitive issue. He is not alone.

Katihar (Bihar): Mohammad Shabaz wakes up at the crack of dawn. Any lingering thoughts of going back to sleep disappear when he thinks of his childhood years. Years spent in distant Delhi when his tiny hands embroidered for hours without a break. Until he was rescued.

As villages stir to life, he wants to be there to catch people’s attention. He leaves home early so that he can start his solo bicycle expedition. He is not on a joy ride but a mission.

The 20-year-old visits at least five villages to spread awareness on the sensitive issue of child trafficking and labour.

Shabaz knows all about the horrors of being forced into labour and exploitation as a child — he was trafficked for work at a young age. After his rescue, he and other trafficked children are creating awareness to prevent it happening to more children.

Child trafficking: Tricking rural villagers with false hope

Shabaz, who now lives in the Kathotiya village of Bihar’s Katihar district, was rescued from a zari factory in Delhi in 2018.

His father is a farm labourer and his income was hardly enough to feed his family of seven. He says he was tricked into sending his son to work in what was supposed to be a good job.

Young children in a village in Bihar playing

“The financial hardships forced my father to send me to work at a tender age. He sent me to Delhi after a villager promised him a better livelihood for me there,” said Shabaz.

A rescue after hardships

But the reality was completely different. At just 13, Shabaz was made to work for up to 17 hours a day in the factory.

“I embroidered clothes and was paid a paltry Rs 3,000 per month. I was denied food for several hours as a break meant a financial loss,” he reminisced.

He was rescued in 2018 thanks to Bachpan Bachao Andolan, a wing of the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF), a non-profit organisation working for children, along with around 30 teens from various Bihari villages.

Shabaz is now in school, studying in Class 9. His wish is that all children get quality education and enjoy their childhood.

Mukti Caravan: A campaign to stop child trafficking

The Mukti Caravan (literally, the liberation caravan) campaign to create awareness on human trafficking was started in Bihar in September 2020 by the Kailash foundation.

It was created after hundreds of children and young adults returned to the villages during the lockdown.

“To prevent them from going back to the inhumane working condition after the lockdowns eased, we roped them in for our anti-trafficking campaign” Rashmi Priya, KSCF’s district coordinator, said.

Shabaz and the other campaigners are paid salaries in the range of Rs 9,000 to 13,000, depending on the number of years they work, and follow a daily routine of bicycling to create awareness.

They are passionate about alerting parents about the menace of falling into traps of villagers who work as traffickers’ agents.

Challenges in campaigning against child trafficking

If the narrow – often mud – roads make cycling difficult, it is more difficult to convince the parents.

The campaigners explain the horrors of child trafficking

“Because poor families consider even small children as breadwinners and dissuading them is not easy,” said Priya.

“People live in utter poverty here and there are no avenues to earn money. How will we eat if they don’t go to cities and earn for their family?” argued Rabina Khatun, a homemaker in Imamnagar village.

Md Chotu of the Imamnagar village – also a survivor – finds campaigning risky as child traffickers consider them a threat.

“We don’t ask people directly about the whereabouts of their children. But we try to explain them the dangers of child trafficking,” he said.

Other issues, like child marriage, become passionate issues the campaigners advocate against.

“Child marriages increased during the lockdown as impoverished families married off their daughters to ease their economic burden,” said Mohammad Sarifull, one of the campaigners.

He said he was attacked last year when he tried to stop a child marriage.

“I received severe injuries. But that hasn’t deterred me,” said Sarifull.

Bihar’s poor track record in human trafficking

With the change in mindset being very slow, it is little wonder that Bihar has a dismal record of human trafficking.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau, in 2017, the state ranked third just behind Rajasthan and West Bengal. That year 362 boys and 33 girls below 18 years of age were rescued from traffickers, which translates to one child being rescued from trafficking every day.

In 2019, 294 minor children from Bihar were rescued from trains across the country, followed by 426 last year (till August 2021).

Climate change impact and trafficking

Priya said that KSCF chose villages that depend heavily on agriculture and face severe impacts from climate change.

Sarifull in a village during his bicycle campaign

Farms and houses in villages, like Imamnagar and Kathotiya, situated on river banks become submerged when the monsoon wreaks havoc.

“People lose their crops and have nothing left for their family expenses. Because of their circumstances, they fall into the trap of traffickers who take advantage of the situation and lure them with good income,” she said. “But sadly, children face hardships and torture in the hands of the traffickers and employers.”

Combined efforts to rescue children bring results

“It’s difficult to stop trafficking because the families willingly send their children,” said Pramila Kumar Prajapati, chairperson of the Bihar State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (BSCPCR). “But we’re taking serious steps to prevent it and ensure that children go to school. We regularly check trains and buses heading to different cities,” Prajapati said.

The campaigning youth are active in trying to rescue children sent away. They have a group on a social media messaging app with youth volunteers in every village sharing alerts about missing children.

“Immediately we contact the cops and check trains going to Rajasthan, Mumbai and Delhi as children are mostly sent to factories in those places,” said Chotu.

The campaign running in 12 districts of Bihar and the coordinated efforts involving the police, have resulted in 323 rescues so far.

Gurvinder Singh is a journalist based in Kolkata.

This story first appeared on Village Square, and is part of a series in the run-up to National Youth Day, January 12, 2023, to highlight inspiring stories about the youth of rural India.

Once Trafficked as ‘Brides’, Now Excluded: In Bihar’s Araria, a Second Chance Eludes Survivors

Sold to out-of-state grooms who, in turn, sold them to others, the women who have managed to escape suffering have returned home to half lives – facing censure from their families and society.

Araria (Bihar): Radha is 26 years old and the mother of a nine-year-old girl. Her father was a farm labourer in Bihar’s Araria district.

A year after he passed away – Radha was in Class 8 then – five strangers arrived at Radha’s house in a car.

“I was married to one of them. In the middle of the night, I was taken to Delhi. Six months into the wedding, my husband started physically abusing me. One day, he sold me,” said Radha.

Mukesh Sharma, Radha’s husband, and a resident of Uttar Pradesh sold her to a brothel in Agra, about 1,200 kms from Araria. Radha was forced into sex work. At the age of 17, she gave birth to her daughter.

After a year, with support from a local woman, who worked as a tea-seller, Radha ran away from the brothel and reached Araria.

“We begged, asked people for directions and managed to reach my mother’s house. Soon after my arrival, I found out that I was two months pregnant. After much contemplation, I decided to go ahead with the pregnancy. Today, I manage to make ends meet by working at a shop and try to educate my daughter,” says Radha.

Radha at her shop. Photo: Seetu Tewari.

But there is little relief. Neither her family, nor larger society treat her well, she says.

“My brothers and sisters-in-law assault me physically and often ask me to leave the house,” says Radha. She fears for her personal safety outside of her home too and wears vermilion – a mark of marriage for Hindu women – to protect herself.

Locals call what happened with Radha ‘dalal wali shaadi,’ or ‘broker’s marriage’.

Bride trafficking is common in India’s eastern state of Bihar, especially in the rural parts of Seemanchal – including Kishanganj, Araria, Katihar, and Purnia districts. Here, recurring disastrous events combined with weak socio-economic situations have thrown residents in an unending cycle of poverty.

NITI Aayog’s 2021-2022 annual report says that 51.91% of Bihar’s population is in the category of Multi Poverty Index (MPI). This is the highest in our country. The Bihar Economic Survey 2021-22 has it that the condition of Araria and Kishanganj districts of Seemanchal is the worst.

Caught in poverty, parents sell their daughters to grooms for as little as Rs 5,000. The amount paid can be as high as Rs 40,000 at times.

For the past two decades, Bhumika Vihar, an organisation based in Bihar, has been working on addressing the issue of bride trafficking in this area. Shilpi Singh, head of the organisation, said the deal is often brokered by an acquaintance. “They keep an eye on the economically weak families in their area and when they see a family especially struggling, they brainwash the girl’s guardians and persuade them to get her married to a man from another state. The wedding is performed secretly,” she added.

Also read: How a Trafficked Woman’s Petition Is Being Used to Push for Detention of ‘Illegal Migrants’

Employees of Bhumika Vihar found that guardians often do not know where the girl will be taken after the wedding.

In the year 2016-17, Bhumika Vihar found 142 such cases in a survey of 10,000 families in Araria and Katihar. Most trafficked brides have ended up in Uttar Pradesh, followed by Haryana, Rajasthan, Delhi, and Punjab, the organisation says.

Very few are like Radha and manage to run away and reach home. Thirty-five-year-old Shyama is one such woman who found her way back to Araria with her three children.

Shyama was sold for Rs 20,000 by her own brothers Surendra and Virendra, who had gone to work as labourers in Punjab.

“My brothers did not attend the wedding. Some people got me married in front of my mother and took me to Punjab. My husband kept me in a house and asked me to sleep with others. Refusal led to more physical violence by my husband. I survived for three years and then ran away with my children. The police arrested me on the train for not having a ticket. But jail was better than being with my husband,” says Shyama. Today, she is a farm labourer. She also sells vegetables in the evening in the Chowk Bazar of her village.

Shyama works in the field. Photo: Seetu Tewari.

As per the National Crime Records Bureau 2021 report, the number of cases of human trafficking registered in the state was 111, as compared to 75 in 2020. At the national level, 2,189 cases were registered in 2021 as compared to 1,714 in 2020.

Suchita Chaturvedi, a member of the Child Protection Commission of Uttar Pradesh, where bride trafficking is taking place on a large scale from Bihar, says, “Whenever trafficking victims are rescued, most of them are from Bihar. They are brought over in the name of education, marriage, etc. Several fake marriage cases have also been caught at Lucknow’s Charbagh railway station.”

Although the cases of bride trafficking are on the rise, such cases do not get recorded in the official statistics of human trafficking.

Stressing the reason behind it, Pammi Singh, the head of Rampur Kodarkatti Panchayat of Araria, says, “Who would frequent the courts and police stations? These people are so poor, their primary concern is food. There is also the fear of defamation if police come to their houses for questioning.”

This fear of defamation, along with acute poverty, is what stopped 25-year-old Jamuna, another survivor of bride trafficking, from going to the police station against what happened to her.

25-year-old Jamuna. Photo: Seetu Tewari.

While her mother Rukhia Devi Rekha refused to talk about her daughter being sold in the name of marriage, Jamuna is upfront about her ordeal. “I was sold for Rs 8,000 to Punjab. My husband would force me to sleep with almost every man around. I ran away, but going to the police station meant my parents would also be implicated, so I had to decide, ‘Should I go to the police station, or should I survive’?” she asks.

Ashok Kumar Singh, the Superintendent of Police, Araria, agrees that cases of bride trafficking rarely come to police’s notice. However, Singh says that police acts whenever it gets complaints on cases related to marriage with the intention to kidnap.

Most women who have managed to return live their lives in silence, with little acknowledgment of their trauma. But most have resolved to build a better life for their own children. “My daughter should get married somewhere nearby. I can marry her to a beggar here but will never get her married in another state,” says Shyama.

Seetu Tewari is the winner of the Sanjoy Ghose Media Awards 2022. You can write to her at connect@charkha.org.