Siliguri, Dec. 11: Six women, two of them teenagers, were rescued at New Delhi station by two youths from Bagdogra on December 5, before they could be trafficked into the capital by a woman who happened to be their neighbour at Hantapara tea estate.

The women, who were wooed by promises of good jobs, returned to New Jalpaiguri today with the help of a Delhi-based Nepali rights group, Jana Adhikar Suraksha Samity.

Sabita Mangar, 41, Patali Mangar, 35, Heera Tamang, 34, Rachana Mangar, 21, Basuri Mangar, 19, and Munni Mangar, 16, are all residents of the partly-functioning estate under Madarihat police station in the Dooars.

None of them had suspected 41-year-old Usha Mehar, the neighbour who promised “cushy” jobs at a watch-strap-making factory, of having links with traffickers or trying to lure them into the sex trade. The women who had never ventured out of Hantapara tea estate were “excited” at the prospect of earning a decent pay, away from the everyday struggle with hunger and poverty at the garden. The initial salary of Rs 1,000 sounded tempting.

On the evening of December 2, the women reached New Jalpaiguri with Mehar. While the group waited for the Delhi-bound Awadh Assam Express, Basuri and Munni met two Nepali youths from Bagdogra, also on their way to Delhi. The youths, who boarded the same coach, struck a friendship with the girls.

On reaching Delhi, the women were about to part when Mehar, haggling with an auto-rickshaw driver over fare, lost temper. The man retaliated with filthy words and disclosed her identity as a girl trafficker. “She immediately disappeared in the crowd. The youths said they had become suspicious of her intentions during the last leg of the journey,” said Rupesh Sharma, a member of a rights group here.

Sharma added that the rights group is trying to locate Mehar.