Calcutta: The elder of the two teenaged sisters allegedly sold off in Kashmir as brides to men more than three times their age faces a struggle to reclaim her life on returning to her village, according to the headmaster who played a role in her rescue last Sunday.

The Class VIII dropout, like many trafficking survivors, won't be staying with the parents who allegedly betrayed her trust. Her younger sister had escaped a similar life of sexual slavery in Kashmir a few months earlier. She has been staying in a hostel for trafficked girls since her return to South 24-Parganas.

"The trauma of being rejected by your parents is possibly more than being subjected to physical torture. It took me months to counsel her sister when she fled from Kashmir and was disowned by her parents on her return," said Chandan Maity, the headmaster of Krishnachandrapur High School in Mathurapur.

The sisters, aged 16 and 14, had set off for Kashmir with their parents last December thinking it was a vacation. They were both married off there, allegedly in exchange for money. The younger one was the first to decide to flee rather than being forced into prostitution. She kept in touch with her sister over phone while Maity contacted people he knew in Kashmir to rescue her.

Activists who help rescue and rehabilitate trafficked girls and women believe that a young survivor going to a government home is possibly not the best option. "Victims are regarded as witnesses in cases (of human trafficking) and have to live a confined life in a government home till the courts decide on them. But what happens is that these children end up spending their entire childhood inside a government shelter while their traffickers roam free," said Bappaditya Mukherjee of Prantakatha. "This is the reason why many girls run away and are sucked into the same cycle of prostitution."

The teenager who walked out of her "in-laws' home" in Pulwama district of Kashmir on Tuesday had been "bought" for Rs 60,000. The family had sold a plot of land to raise the cash.

Arshie Qureshi of Kashmir Women's Collective, the NGO that helped rescue the girl, said: "She left everything behind except a pair of junk earrings given by her mother."