Express News Service
NEW DELHI: India being the source and a destination for trafficking – especially of minor girls – the Centre has chalked out plans to block human trade by helping the border states to plug gaps.
While the Centre has provided money to states under the Nirbhaya Fund to set up and strengthen anti-human trafficking units (AHTUs) in every district of the country, the government has now decided to provide financial assistance to states and Union Territories in border areas to set up protection and rehabilitation homes for the victims of trafficking, particularly for the minor girls and young women, said an official from the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
These homes will provide services like shelter, food, clothing, counselling, primary health facilities and other daily requirements to these trafficked girls. The source countries are Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar, where women and girls are getting trafficked in the guise of being provided a better life, jobs and good living conditions in India.
“The majority of them are minor girls or women of younger age, who after their arrival in India are sold or forced into commercial sex work,” the official added. ‘These girls often reach major cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad etc., from where they are taken out of the country mainly in the Middle East and South East Asian countries,” the official said.
This is the reason, ministry officials said, that the bordering states to these countries need to be more vigilant and need to have adequate facilities to provide relief and rehabilitation services for the victims.Officials said that apart from strengthening the AHTUs, funding has also been provided for AHTUs in border guarding forces such as the BSF and SSB.
Now there are 788 AHTUs, including 30 in functional border forces. The victims will be produced before the child welfare committee to declare fit for providing sponsorship as per the Mission Vatsalya Scheme guideline. Accordingly, the states/UTs will be requested to do the needful, the official said. He added that it may not be possible to set up these facilities, so the states are free to take any building or government building on rent.
Under Juvenile Justice Act 2015 (as amended in 2021), any facility being run by a governmental organisation or a voluntary or NGO registered under any law can take temporary responsibility for a child for a specific purpose.
NEW DELHI: India being the source and a destination for trafficking – especially of minor girls – the Centre has chalked out plans to block human trade by helping the border states to plug gaps.
While the Centre has provided money to states under the Nirbhaya Fund to set up and strengthen anti-human trafficking units (AHTUs) in every district of the country, the government has now decided to provide financial assistance to states and Union Territories in border areas to set up protection and rehabilitation homes for the victims of trafficking, particularly for the minor girls and young women, said an official from the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
These homes will provide services like shelter, food, clothing, counselling, primary health facilities and other daily requirements to these trafficked girls. The source countries are Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar, where women and girls are getting trafficked in the guise of being provided a better life, jobs and good living conditions in India.googletag.cmd.push(function() {googletag.display(‘div-gpt-ad-8052921-2’); });
“The majority of them are minor girls or women of younger age, who after their arrival in India are sold or forced into commercial sex work,” the official added. ‘These girls often reach major cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad etc., from where they are taken out of the country mainly in the Middle East and South East Asian countries,” the official said.
This is the reason, ministry officials said, that the bordering states to these countries need to be more vigilant and need to have adequate facilities to provide relief and rehabilitation services for the victims.
Officials said that apart from strengthening the AHTUs, funding has also been provided for AHTUs in border guarding forces such as the BSF and SSB.
Now there are 788 AHTUs, including 30 in functional border forces. The victims will be produced before the child welfare committee to declare fit for providing sponsorship as per the Mission Vatsalya Scheme guideline. Accordingly, the states/UTs will be requested to do the needful, the official said. He added that it may not be possible to set up these facilities, so the states are free to take any building or government building on rent.
Under Juvenile Justice Act 2015 (as amended in 2021), any facility being run by a governmental organisation or a voluntary or NGO registered under any law can take temporary responsibility for a child for a specific purpose.
