Criticises ‘systemic failure to address forced labour’

The abuse of girls at government-run shelter homes including the Muzaffarpur shelter abuse case of 34 minor girls in Bihar has found mention in the United States Department of States annual-Trafficking in Persons Report June 2019, released on Thursday.

The report criticised India for “systemic failure to address forced labor” adding that “sex trafficking in government-run and government-funded shelter homes remained a serious problem.”

India remained in the Tier 2 category along with countries like Pakistan, Nepal, Nigeria, and Singapore among others.

The Tier 2 countries are the ones where governments do not fully meet the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards, the report explained. India has remained in this category since 2012.

“The Government of India does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. The government demonstrated overall increasing efforts compared to the previous reporting period; therefore India remained on Tier 2,” the report said.

According to it, serious challenges in oversight of government-run and government-funded shelters continued in 2018 and some of these cases drew the Supreme Court’s attention

“Victims alleged in a few cases that government officials facilitated trafficking and, in three cases were clients of shelter residents exploited in sex trafficking. In one government-funded shelter, at least five girls died after sex trafficking, and traffickers buried them on the shelter’s premises; victims alleged both government and NGO officials facilitated the sex trafficking and were among the clients of the victims at that shelter,” the report said.

Expert study

It said a Bihar government commissioned study noted abuse “varying in forms and degrees of intensity” to be prevalent in almost all 110 government-funded women and child care institutions surveyed and noted “grave concerns” in 17 institutions that required immediate attention.

“In at least two cases allegedly involving sex trafficking in government-funded shelters, lawyers and media reported government officials impeded the investigation. In Deoria (Uttar Pradesh) despite 20 letters from the district government to cease sending vulnerable women and children to a shelter operating without proper registration, three police superintendents sent at least 405 girls to the shelter over two years,” the report said.

It also said that though the government officially abolished bonded labour in 1976, the system of forced labor still exists. “For example, under one scheme prevalent in granite quarries in India, quarry owners offer wage advances or loans with exorbitant interest rates, trapping workers in debt bondage — in some cases for their entire lives,” it said.