Human Trafficking in  [India]  [other countries]
Street Children in  [India]  [other countries]
Child Prostitution in  [India]  [other countries]
 

Child Prostitution

The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children

Republic of India                                                                     [ Country-by-Country Reports ]

The Republic of India [map] is the second most populous country in the world, stretching from the Arabian Sea (W) to the Bay of Bengal (E), bordering Pakistan (W); China, Nepal, and Bhutan (N); Bangladesh (NE); and Myanmar (E).  New Delhi is its capital and Bombay (Mumbai) its largest city.  An estimated 400 million are children between 0 and 18 years of age.  Although acceleration in economic growth has made India among the 10 fastest growing developing countries, the country’s per capita income remains low and 26 per cent of the population live below the income poverty line.

 

CAUTION:  The following links and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in India.  Some of these links may lead to websites that present allegations that are unsubstantiated, misleading or even false.   No attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content.

ECPAT – On-line form for reporting child prostitution and other sexual offences against children

Quick Search for Missing Children - Select Gender, Country (India), and Years Missing

National Plan of Action

CHILDLINE - Toll Free Call 1098 - Night & Day

CHILDLINE reaches out to all children in need of care and protection such as: street children, child labourers, children who have been abused, child victims of flesh trade, differently-abled children, child addicts, children in conflict with the law, children in institutions, mentally challenged children, HIV/AIDs infected children, children affected by conflict and disaster, child political refugees, children whose families are in crises.

Delhi Govt. Started the toll free 'Youth Phone service’  1-800-11-6888

The Government of Delhi running the 'youth' helpline named Yuva Phone line in Delhi. The counsellors are available round the clock on toll free no 1800116888.  The helpline is specially for students.

Website to track missing children launched

Anyone who has lost their child can post a message on this website and a search will be set in motion simultaneously in 40 cities in the country.  Launched by Don Bosco National Forum for Youth at Risk in association with UNICEF, www.missingchildsearch.net will be closely watched and monitored by child welfare organisations in all major cities in the country and a search will be generated immediately. The Don Bosco National Forum for Youth at Risk is a major partner of Childline India Foundation and extends service to hundreds of children who are victims of war, conflict, natural calamities, sexual exploitation, trafficking and HIV/AIDS. They also take care of street and working children.

U.S. Dept of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs

INCIDENCE AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - Commercial sexual exploitation of children, including child sex tourism, occurs in major cities. India is a source, destination, and transit country for trafficking of children for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and other forms of exploitive labor.  Children are reported to be trafficked from India to the Middle East and Western countries such as the United States and Europe; into India from Bangladesh and Nepal; and through the country to Pakistan and the Middle East.  Mumbai, Calcutta and New Delhi are major destination cities for young girls trafficked from Nepal and Bangladesh for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation. Children are also trafficked within India for sexual exploitation and forced or bonded labor. Organized crime and police corruption were common factors that contributed to the overall situation of trafficking in India. An August 2004 study by the government estimated that almost half of the trafficked children interviewed were between the ages of 11 to 14 years.

Bur of Democracy, Human Rights & Labor - Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2005

TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS - An estimated 6 to 10 thousand children from Nepal and Bangladesh were trafficked into the country annually for commercial sexual exploitation. Girls as young as seven years of age were trafficked from economically depressed neighborhoods in Nepal, Bangladesh, and rural areas of the country to the major prostitution centers of Mumbai, Calcutta, and New Delhi. NGOs estimated that there were approximately 100 to 200 thousand women and girls working in brothels in Mumbai, and 40 to 100 thousand in Calcutta.

Concluding Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) - 2004

[74] The Committee expresses its concern at the increasing number of child victims of sexual exploitation, including prostitution and pornography. Concern is also expressed at the insufficient programs for the physical and psychological recovery and social reintegration of child victims of such abuse and exploitation.

Women emerge as primary victims in trafficking

Porous borders with economically poorer Bangladesh and Nepal (from where none need visa to visit India) aggravate the problem of cross-border trafficking. Bangladesh remained a source country for women and children for a quite a long time, traffickers target their preys in the poverty stricken rural areas.  On the other hand, Nepal is identified as a source country in the region. Fair looking Nepali young women are the primary victims of the trafficking, though new trend emerges with attraction for boys too. Unconfirmed statistics reveal that in average 12,000 Nepali women with minors are trafficked every year for sexual exploitation in outer countries. Most of the trafficked women from Nepal were later found infected with HIV/AIDS and also tuberculosis.

Addressing the conference, the minister Ms Chowdhury also argued that trafficking is by and large a gendered phenomenon. The trafficking in India is primarily for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation. There are nearly three million sex workers in India and 40 per cent of them are children or adolescent girls. Statistics reveal that children below the age of 10 years are also found in the brothel of Indian cities like Mumbai and Delhi now a day, the minister disclosed.  "Many believe that having sex with young and virgin girls would cure them of diseases. It is nonsense," Ms Chowdhury uttered. She emphasized on reducing the demand for prostitutes, engagement of children in workplaces, use of forced labour and empowering all collaborative efforts of governments, NGOs and other institutions to deal with the situation. - htcp

Action plan to combat human trafficking

According to the Minister of State for Women and Child Development (independent charge), Renuka Chowdhury, there were about three million sex workers, 40 per cent of whom were children, and their demand was increasing.

Over 650 Indian trafficking victims rescued: UNODC

Over 650 Indians, including 138 minors, who were victims to human trafficking, were rescued during the first six months of this year, an United Nations agency said here today.

He claimed the average age of girls being trafficked in South Asia was dropping.  "While in 1980, the average age of trafficked girls was 14 to 16 years, it dropped to 10-14 years in 1994. The figure in 2006 has decreased," he said.

Natalie Grant Helps Expand Efforts against Human Trafficking

Grant has been able to witness the process first hand with her travels around the world, particularly a trip to the red-light district of Mumbai, India.  "I was walking down the street in Mumbai, in broad daylight, when my eyes locked on a little girl, maybe 6 or 7 years old, peering out of a cage, looking at us on the street below. It was beyond my imagination," said Grant on her website. "I'll never forget that moment. That was her life. Every day people walked by, and they didn't even notice her."

"Homelessness and poverty are tragic enough," added Grant, "but some of these children are kept in cages and forced to perform heinous, unfathomable acts 50 and 60 times a day. And you never hear anyone talk about it."

No age of innocence, this Study reveals 14% of sex workers are children aged 10-17

If this makes you wince, there is more. A study conducted by Global Organisation for Life Development, an NGO, in co-ordination with Guwahati police has revealed that a startling 14 per cent of those involved in prostitution are children aged between 10 and 17. And those who gratify their lurid and perverse desires by exploiting children are not part of the city’s underbelly but affluent, well-heeled people who lend Guwahati much of its sheen.

Behind every minor languishing in the flesh trade is a heartrending tale. Some have been forced into prostitution by acquaintances or relatives, while others have been lured by the hope of a better life. For a few, the parents themselves turned into pimps.  Police have identified Kalapahar, Nabin Nagar, Rajgarh, Pandu, Dispur, Beltola, Ganeshguri and Hatigaon areas of Guwahati as hubs of prostitution and trafficking.

Untamed legacy

WHAT WAS IT IN THE REPORT THAT MOVED YOU AND HOW DID YOU GET INTO THE MATTER? - I cannot talk about it in detail but at one point I read, “The Dommara tribe from Andhra Pradesh and several tribes across the Northern belt of the country practice family-based prostitution. The Dommara tribe’s pushing their girls into prostitution at puberty is the most extreme example of prostitution - based gender oppression within a community. Sex abuse of girls in this system manifests even before the girls’ initiation into the system. Young girls who will be initiated into the system are often subjected to sexual abuse from family and villages right upto the time of their initiation ceremony. At that point, they go through a ritual that is typical in that they are married to the village deity. The girls are forced to submit to group sex with village leaders and priests within the temple for a full week while her family and the rest of the village feasts and celebrates. My grief knew no ends but I at the same time resolved to research on the matter myself.

Documentary tells story of India's child prostitutes

The India story becomes only sadder: Ling tells us that there are half a million "sex slaves" in India, and that the average age of a prostitute is 14.

Human trafficking on the rise

The increase in human trafficking cases in the last couple of years is worrying NGOs and exposes the government’s apathy towards the social evil.  Figures say that more than 60 girls from Karnataka, who fell prey to human trafficking, have been rescued from brothels and red light areas in Mumbai, Kolkata and Delhi.  These rescued girls, in the age-group of 12 to 20 years, are mostly from the northern districts of Bijapur, Bagalkot, Shimoga, Mysore, Mandya and Chamrajnagar.  They fall easy prey to the agents who assure them of jobs and attractive earnings, but they land up in brothels.

State unaware of child abuse situation, projecting deflated figues

The pilgrim town of Puri is a haven for child prostitution and rampant paedophilia. A recent study conducted by the Institute of Socio Economic Development with support from United Nations Development Fund for Women says that Puri is the heart of child trafficking and accounts for over 43 percent of the cases.

But the State Administration and Police make no attempt to move because the holy town also happens to be a tourist hotspot.

How to change the world - The role of the social entreprenuer

As Childline expanded to new cities, the call-tracking system also emerged as an important source of child protection information. National data showed that the biggest killer of street children was tuberculosis, but regional call patterns revealed a variety of local problems. In Jaipur, for example, childline received reports of abuse in the garment and jewelry industries. In Varanasi, there were reports of children being abducted to work in the sari industry. In Delhi, many calls came from middle-class children. In Nagpur, a transit hub, there were frequent reports of children abandoned in train stations. In Goa, a beach resort, a major problem was the sexual abuse of children by foreign tourists.

Using minors in prostitution is a billion dollar industry in the city

For most, Mumbai remains a city of dreams. But, for some, it has become a place full of nightmares.  In recent years, the financial capital of the country has emerged as one of the leading markets for trafficked minors who engage in prostitution or, in other words, the commercial sexual abuse of a minor.

As instances of HIV and AIDS reach alarming proportions, demand for younger, pre-puberty girls has hit an all-time high. Girls as little as seven and eight-years-old are being forced into prostitution, both in the red-light areas and as “professional” call girls (always accompanied by an adult), according to a DNA investigation.  “Trafficking in minor girls has seen an estimated 30 per cent increase from previous years,” says a social activist working at Kamatipura — the city’s most notorious red-light district.

“Poverty due to prolonged drought, mounting farm debts, unemployment and lack of livelihood are the triggering factors, which are forcing parents to send their daughters out of town for employment.”   “Even when girls are rescued, families are unwilling to take them back,” says the police source. “This has become a common story in the rural areas.”

From street child to surgeon, Indian girl follows dream

Chand’s mother was a prostitute with 16 children living in Japiur’s red light area, and the girl — her family name has been withheld to protect her — was already a child prostitute when she ran away to eke an existence on the streets aged six.

Even for Chand, there is the constant threat of her past dragging her back to wreck her future.

“If I saw my family again they would want me back to become a prostitute again to earn money,” she said simply.

Nepali

When they brought me here, it was in a taxi. I kept looking around, wondering what kind of work was going on in this area of this big city. Everywhere I looked, I saw curtained doorways and rooms. Men would go and come through these curtained entrances. People on the street would be calling out, “Two rupees, two rupees.” I asked the other Nepali women if these were offices; it seemed the logical explanation. In two days I knew everything. I cried. Tara N., a Nepali woman who was trafficked into India at sixteen.

Child prostitution in India

A survey conducted by Indian Health Organization of a red light area of Bombay shows:-

1.     20% of the one lakh prostitutes are children.

2.     25% of the child prostitutes had been abducted and sold.

3.     6% had been raped and sold.

4.     8% had been sold by their fathers after forcing them into incestuous relationships.

5.     2 lakh minor girls between ages 9yrs-20yrs were brought every year from Nepal to India and 20,000 of them are in Bombay brothels.

6.     15% to 18% are adolescents between 13 yrs and 18 yrs.

Bombay HC Lambasts Police Inaction in Curbing Human Trafficking

The court was told that the number of minor girls rescued from brothels during the last three years was shocking. As many as 26 girls were rescued in 2003, twelve in 2004, 31 girls were rescued in 2005 and 27 during the current year, the court was told.

Human trafficking from Nepal on rise

Trafficking of Nepalese women and children into India, especially from the western districts, has increased significantly in recent days due to lax security at border checkpoints.

A large number of women and children are being trafficked into India from checkpoints west of Butwal, representatives of several Indian and Nepalese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and security officials stated during an interaction on 'controlling cross-border human trafficking'.

Sex Workers in the City of Joy

ONE WOMAN’S STORY - At 14, Pandey was married off to a man 20 years her senior who had designs on inheriting her ailing father’s government job and a cut of his pension. When another sister’s husband got the position instead, the abuse began.

Families of Bharatpur push their minor girls into prostitution

The girls are mostly aged between 12 and 15, though some are as young as 10. They stand at the roadside along with their fathers and brothers who fix the 'price' for them.

“What can we do, we have to send our daughters into this profession as there are no alternative means of livelihood.”

India is transit hub for human trafficking

'Although Mumbai and Goa are the favourite destinations for paedophilic activity, where children are trafficked, tourist destinations in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Orissa are also not far behind,' Kant said.

Who’s responsible for child prostitution?

In 10 per cent of the cases, the relatives are responsible for forcing a girl into prostitution, and in 12.6 per cent of cases, the neighbours and friends are responsible. Paramours, lovers and even the husbands are responsible in 50 per cent of cases for forcing a girl into prostitution.

Sexual Slavery; AIDS; India's Hidden Enemy1

Though it's been against the law since 1982, as many as 5,000 families each year still offer daughters to a deity or temple, sometimes before the girls reach puberty. Secret wedding services take place at night, and child-brides, each month, are given in marriage to the gods. It's usually the priests, or uncles, who take the devadasis' virginity -- once they've had their first period. Then, at a price which starts at the equivalent of a few dollars, they belong to upper-caste community members. Or whoever can pay, as they try to compete with traditional sex workers. Often, the women do their duty to the gods, and men, while living with their parents. The temple girls are never allowed to marry. They are common property. The men -- for a night or months or even years -- own them, body and soul.

Slavery in Our Time

Historians will look back in puzzlement at the way our 21st century world tolerates the slavery of more than a million children in brothels around the world.

India alone may have half a million children in its brothels, more than any other country in the world. Visit the brothel district in almost any city in India, and you can meet 14-year-old girls who have been kidnapped off the street, or drugged, or offered jobs as maids, and then sold into a world that they often escape only by dying of AIDS.

Indo-Pak girls forced into prostitution

In a startling case of organised women trafficking that has come to light, Pakistani and Indian girls aged between 11 and 13 are being smuggled to the Middle East countries for being forced into prostitution there. The girls, who are shown as aged between 20 and 22 on their passports, are brought to these countries on the pretext of getting them attracting jobs.

Working Together - Fighting the sex-trafficking menace

The Prerana Anti-Trafficking Center is a nongovernmental organization run by Pravin and Priti Patkar in Mumbai, India. The Patkars have initiated many programs, trainings, and camps to assist victims of the sex trade. They have developed curricula for training police and service providers. They run a camp every year for vulnerable children to prevent them from being drawn into the sex industry. The Patkars run a night shelter to protect the children of women who do not yet have the resources to leave prostitution, but want their children away from the red-light area. They have challenged traffickers in court when traffickers tried to regain custody of girls rescued in raids, and they have advocated for stronger laws against pimps and traffickers.

Hitting Brothel Owners where it Hurts

Imagine what you would have done if you'd been in Hasina Bibi's sandals.  She was a lonely 16-year-old working in a garment factory in Bangladesh when an older employee began mothering her. They grew close, and one day the older woman gave Hasina some cakes to eat.  Two days later, Hasina emerged from a drug-induced stupor in India, sold to a brothel in faraway Gujarat. The brothel's owner beat Hasina and threatened to deform her face with acid if she tried to escape. She had to do whatever the customers wanted, with or without condoms.

Prostitution of Nepalese girls rampant in Indian brothel

''Young girls are trafficked from Nepal to brothels in Mumbai and Kolkata at an average age of twelve. They are trapped into the vicious cycle of prostitution, debt and slavery. By the time they are in their mid-twenties, they are at the dead end or 'cul-de-sac','' the study noted.

USAID Funds NGO in India that Helps Brothels Retain Child Prostitute

In May, Restore International, an anti-trafficking non-governmental organization (NGO) in India that works to stop underage prostitution, performed a raid that resulted in the rescue of 35 girls from an Indian brothel. A Bush Administration official told the Friday Fax that while Indian law allows legal prostitution, it is forbidden for girls under the age of 18. The source said such teenage prostitutes are common due to the easy accessibility of forged documents.

Teen escapes sex trade

Tasmina Khatun agreed to elope with Muku Mondal, a man she loved, not knowing the nightmare she was inviting.  Police yesterday rescued the 15-year-old girl from the Sunderbans when she was about to be taken to Kashmir to be sold off to flesh traders.

Speaking out for the `nameless'

"Anamika" (the nameless) is a documentary on trafficking of women and children from Andhra Pradesh to various parts of the country.  It narrates how young girls are deceived, forced or coerced to enter the trade every year.

ECPAT: Fifth Report on implementation of the Agenda for Action [DOC]

[B] COUNTRY UPDATES – INDIA – The Government of India has had a national Plan of Action to Combat Trafficking and Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Women and Children since 1998. The plan provides specific measures to be taken by Central and State Governments for the prevention and suppression of CSEC. The Government states that it has given financial support to NGOs to rehabilitate victims and their children through education and income generation programs, as well as to provide temporary shelter in transit homes. However, NGOs claim that the government is inactive in implementing the Plan of Action and that most of the programs remain only on paper.

National Center For Missing Children India - National Center For Missing Children (NCMC) is a non-political, non-profit making and a non-governmental organization offering the services free of charge.

Thailand Ranks Third in Number of Child Prostitution – (India Ranks First)

Thailand ranks third after India and the U.S. in the number of child prostitutes, the United Nations (UN) said in its report prepared for the Second World Congress Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation.  According to the U.N. report, about 400,000 women and children are believed to be sexually exploited in India, between 244,000 and 325,000 in the U.S., 200,000 in Thailand, 175,000 in eastern and central Europe, 100,000 in Brazil and 35,000 in West Africa.

Child Prostitution in Nepal/India

Every year, thousands of Nepalese girls, some as young as 11 are sent to or procured for brothels in the big Indian cities, like Bombay or Calcutta.  They are often the daughters of poor farming families, where everyone must help with the family income.

Child Prostitution In India

Ironically child prostitution is a special category of rigorous case of child labor and it raises more troubling ethical problems than child labor in general.

Arabian Sex Tourism

Sunita Krishnan, head of an anti human-trafficking organization, Prajwala, makes the only too-obvious point that girl children are not valued. "If a girl child is sold or her life ruined, it is not a national loss, that's why this is a non-issue, both for community and to society."

The Local Context

Certain studies in India indicate that over 50% of girls are raped before reaching the age of 15.  A decade-long drought in the area around Madurai, has provoked a rural exodus. A large part of the population that is leaving for the cities consists of children.  Fending alone for themselves, they are easy targets for gangs who are always searching for new recruits. In this way, a lot of children wind up in organized crime, prostitution, become shoplifters or purse-snatchers, middlemen in the resale of stolen goods, drug-dealers, mendicants...

Child Prostitution Figures Up in India

Girls under 14 years of age constitute 30 percent of 900,000 prostitutes in India.  It was also estimated that in the coming years, the situation could become worse if the rehabilitation is not provided to the “retired” prostitutes, who drag children in this profession as the source of income.

When Police Act As Pimps: Glimpses Into Child Prostitution In India.

A random sample of 28 out of 86 brothels along the G. B. Road in India revealed that almost 60% of the prostitutes were children.  Police officers extort money from traffickers, prostitutes, and madams and abet the system of prostitution through a scheme of false registration of the girls that creates the fiction that they are not minors.

Cops Involved In Child Prostitution

Social activist Anson Thomas, who has accompanied the police in at least 14 raids at brothels in Nagpada and D B Marg areas, alleged that some constables and sub-inspectors are known for taking bribes directly from minors.

A Brief Report on Study on CSEC [DOC]

STUDY IN CHILD PROSTITUTION BY CCCL - The study revealed the policies of promoting tourism without being sensitive to the local needs, is causing a phenomenal growth in child prostitution. The study pointed out that the golden triangle of tourism on Agra- Delhi Jaipur belt has spewed a flourishing trade in child prostitution among Rajasthan’s nomadic tribes-with middlemen coercing and luring girls as young as ten years into sex business.  Growing tourism is major contributing factor to this phenomenon.

Children and Women Trafficking in Nepal

It was 10 years ago.13-year-old Mira of Nepal was offered a job as a domestic worker in Mumbai, India. Instead she arrived at a brothel on Mumbai's Falkland Road, where tens of thousands of young women are displayed in row after row of zoo-like animal cages. Her father had been duped into giving her to a trafficker. When she refused to have sex, she was dragged into a torture chamber in a dark alley used for 'breaking-in' new girls. She was locked in a narrow, windowless room without food or water. On the fourth day, one of the goondas (thug) wrestled her to the floor and banged her head against the concrete. When she awoke, she was naked. Later she was raped by the goonda and red chilly powder was put into her vagina. Afterwards, she complied with their demands. The madam told Mira that she had been sold to the brothel for 75,000 rupees (about US$ 1,000), that she had to work until she paid off her debt. Now when she returned back to her house and told that she was carrying AIDS she was prejudiced from her family and society so she is staying in rehabilitation center in Kathmandu.

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Human Trafficking in  [India]  [other countries]
Street Children in  [India]  [other countries]
Child Prostitution in  [India]  [other countries]