Day 10: March Catches Trafficker and Rescues Two Boys From Slavery

After entering into the Indian mainland from Nepal through Forbesgunj border, the South Asian March Against Child Trafficking marched through the town of Forbesgunj shouting slogans against child trafficking and slavery. Then, at the Forbesgunj Railway station, a public meeting was held. While the meeting was going on at the station, Vinay Singh, National Secretary, Bachpan Bachao Andolan and Neeraj Verma, activist saw a man with 2 boys, who did not look like their guardian. The man was acting suspicious and Mr. Singh and Mr. Verma went to talk to him and the boys. As they talked to the man and the boys, they found that the boys had been sold to work for a meagre amount of Rs. 500 in Kurukshetra in Haryana. On further questioning it was gleaned that although the trafficker said he was taking them to Kurukshetra, the tickets were in fact till Ludhiana in Punjab.

As Mr. Verma engaged the man in an argument, Mr. Singh went to alert the Railway Protection Force (RPF). The RPF arrested the trafficker and he was sent to police custody and booked under the relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code by the activists of BBA. The boys rescued were from Forbesgunj and aged 9 years and 10 years respectively. The boys have been handed over to their parents.

As a direct impact of the March, on 4 March, 16 trafficked girls and boys were rescued from Siliguri. These children from Bihar were trafficked to Siliguri and from Siliguri were on route to the commercial centres of Kolkata and Mumbai. The children were rescued by the police. The police recognised the role of the South Asian March Against Child Trafficking in generating awareness for the tip-off that lead to the rescue of these children.

For more updates log on to www.globalmarch.org and www.bba.org.in.