Dimapur, Nov. 26: Vulnerable Naga girls have been lured with promises of plum jobs to Thailand, Hong Kong or closer home to Mumbai and then forced to indulge in the flesh trade.
This shocking revelation was made in a random survey of movement of job-seeking grown-up girls and “children of poverty” from the region, carried out by an NGO — the North East Development Action and Networking (NEDAN). The survey said Naga girls have become most vulnerable in falling prey to the notorious global human traffickers.
“We have cracked cases of women from Nagaland ending up in brothels in Mumbai as captives of pimps. There are poor children from here and Bangladesh being trafficked for camel racing in Saudi Arabia. In one incident relating to Nagaland, as many as 45 girls were lured to Mumbai. They ended up being physically exploited and abused. We could trace out only a few and the rest have simply vanished,” Digambar Narzari, director of NEDAN, said.
NEDAN held a workshop at a hotel here today to chalk out a strategy to combat the growing dimension of the problem at the state level.
Representatives from mass-based NGOs such as the Naga Students Federation and Youth Association of Nagaland, those working on related issues, socially concerned individuals and the media participated in the workshop.
Some concrete suggestions to tackle the threat also came up during the discussions. Stress was laid on network of mass-based NGOs, religious organisations and village councils for developing an action plan to eradicate the problem.
The need to develop a common regional approach and sensitise the state governments was also stressed.
The participants also urged the state governments to set up woman police cells in each district of the region and support establishment of rehabilitation centres for victims.
At the start of the programme, Narzari gave a brief account of the issue.
The human traffickers often resort to recruitment, transportation, transfer and lure girls. When these fail, they use force and coercion, he said.
Resource person Rajeev Sharma, director of Global Organisation for Life Development, said a victim of human trafficking has some common traits. “Those who do not have the right to select sexual partners or areforced into sex without consent are termed as victims,” Sharma said, adding, “The worst part of denying the power of bargain is that those denied are naturally vulnerable to diseases such as HIV/AIDS.
“We have to raise the awareness level at every stratum because this region is very vulnerable to traffickers. Generally, traffickers hunt for their victims in poverty-stricken areas such as flood-affected and insurgency-hit ones from where desolate girls are easily lured to strange and distant places,” Sharma said.
“We have done several ground-surveys in Siliguri, visiting brothels under cover and found girls from the Northeast. They try to hide their identity out of fear,” he said.
“Missing persons’ data in Assam reflect the dimension of the problem. The figure is increasing each year. Then there is the unreported cases,” he said.
Among the participants at the workshop were senior BJP leader N.C. Zeliang, Bible Society of India’s representative Rev. Notoy Achumi, NSF speaker Phushika Aomi and other prominent social activists.
