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Trafficking of children, girls and women for forced labour
Trafficking is closely linked to forced migration. It has been
most often linked to prostitution but trafficking takes
considerable magnitude for forced labour, especially domestic
work. Trafficking of children-girls-women for domestic work is one
of the fastest growing areas in inter-country and intra-country
trafficking. Children, girls and women are predominantly
trafficked from rural, tribal areas or drought and cyclone ridden
areas into cities of India. Many of them are even trafficked to
foreign countries.
There are numerous cases of abuse and
exploitation of trafficked girls and women. National Domestic
Workers’ Movement has discovered that most of the women, children
and their families do not realise what they are getting themselves
into. The problem gains more magnitude because our existing
legislations are not able to deal with the issues. The Prevention
of Immoral Trafficking Act, 1956 talks only of trafficking for
immoral purposes and not for forced or bonded labour. Similarly
the Inter-state Migrant Workmen’s Act, 1979 do not protect the
migrant or trafficked domestic workers. Further, the children,
girls and women are sometimes brought to the cities secretly and
are sometimes inaccessible. In foreign countries many domestic
workers are undocumented or illegal immigrants.
Trafficking agents are plenty. In Delhi alone
there over and above hundreds of agencies which sell domestic
workers. NDWM has also discovered that sometimes other domestic
workers and close relatives become agents of trafficking. This
points to the well-organized nature of the entire racket. Once the
girls arrive in the cities, their wages are typically locked or
they go unpaid in order to pay the traffickers a fee for securing
employment.
Prevention of Trafficking
In order
to prevent trafficking, NDWM has carried out work at both the
source and destination areas.
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Trace trafficking agents in order to reveal
them and protect the target group from the clutches of
exploitation
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Facilitate the formation of village level vigilant
committees to prevent trafficking
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Facilitate the formation of SHGs (Self Help Groups), income and livelihood generation programmes economic
independence, in order, to help curb trafficking.
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Capacity building of SHGs and support groups.
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Life Skills/vocational training and non-formal
education to children who have dropped out of school.
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Participation of village Panchayat and local
governments to bring about resolutions toward anti-trafficking.
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Work with villagers to prevent uninformed
migration and trafficking of women, girls and children
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Conduct pre-departure programmes to prepare
inter and intra country migrant domestic workers of situations of
work and how to handle the same.
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To network with other non-government
organisations, government organisations, policy makers and police
to facilitate rescue, rehabilitation and repatriation.
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Psychosocial support to women and children
(vulnerable to trafficking/ and those who have been rescued
victims)
In order
to curb international migration, we have taken similar
steps:
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Pre-departure manuals have been disseminated to
increase awareness of the risks and challenges of migration.
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The plight of migrant domestic workers abroad
have been documented.
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Active advocacy and lobbying is carried out.
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Crisis interventions are carried out to
victimised individuals.
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Networks are established with other NGOs that
work on international migration.
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