Face-to-face with human trafficking

Living as we do in cities, we rarely come face-to-face with human trafficking. Somehow, simply reading about it never gives a sense of what it is really like. A couple of weeks ago, when I met Bhagirath Mohanta at Plan India’s Impact Award 2018 ceremony where he was recognised for his work as a community volunteer, his story made me realise that in villages across India, trafficking is an omnipresent concern.

Since in rural Odisha, there are very few job opportunities outside agricultural labour, it is common for people to seek jobs in cities through labour contractors. Assuming that there is safety in numbers, villagers, many of them underage and most of them illiterate, go with these contractors in groups to seek their fortunes. At the best of times and in the best of conditions, these migrants are disempowered.

Mohanta, a retired teacher who has now devoted himself to community service, has seen many bright young girls in his village transform into domestic slaves and overworked labourers. He told me about the 14-yearold whose marriage he was unable to prevent. “At 15, she became a mother, but has been sick ever since…” he said. “My heart breaks when I see her, and now I use her example to educate parents about the pitfalls of getting their daughters married early.” But all these stories pale in comparison to the cases of human trafficking he has seen.

Here’s the story of the last trafficking case he witnessed. “Last year, a stranger came to a nearby village and told everyone that there were many job opportunities in a prawn farm in Paradip,” he said. The agent offered ~5,000 to each worker’s family and everyone thought it seemed like a good deal. Eventually, seven underage girls and four boys went with the agent. Everyone was impressed when 15 days later, the agent returned, saying that there was a demand for more girls. Then, some weeks later, the boys in the group returned to the village. They said that the ‘agent’ had turned out to be a trafficker who took them all to a Delhi brothel. Now here’s the happy twist.

Mohanta has been working to organise the children in his area into committees. “There were so many issues children were facing — being forced to drop out of school, the prospect of early marriage and being sent off to work - that we decided to empower them as a group,” he said. The boys told their local children’s committee what had happened, and together they went to the police. “Eventually they managed to rescue three girls,” he said. “The rest remain missing…” This incident made him realise that something needed to be done. With the children’s clubs, he went from village to village to spread awareness about trafficking. Even better, the children’s clubs insisted that every village panchayat made a register of labour contractors. “Now only a registered contractor can come to the village and take people to the city for jobs,” he said.

Even today, Mohanta’s face clouds over when he talks of the missing girls. “I feel sad that we’ve not been able to do anything for them,” he says. “But we are doing our level best to ensure that no other girl meets their fate.”