Assam's missing women and the sex trade
By Subir Bhaumik
BBC News, Assam
Many of the missing women end up like these alleged arrested
call girls
The biggest problem in India's north-eastern state of Assam is separatist
militancy. But it faces another, less well known issue. Thousands of its women,
old and young, have gone missing over the past 10 years. A recent police
report says 3,184 women and 3,840 female children have gone missing in the
state since 1996. That's around two females a day on average. The report
was compiled by Assam police and their research branch, the Bureau of Police
Research and Development. The local police are far too busy, according to
Assam police intelligence chief Khagen Sarmah, fighting insurgents. "Our
counter-insurgency commitments affects our normal policing duties like checking
trafficking." "Too many policemen are involved fighting the insurgents rather
than following up on other crimes," Mr Sarmah said. 'Good looking women'
The Assam police recently rescued some girls working as call-girls around Delhi
or used as "sex slaves" by wealthy landlords in states
like Punjab and Haryana. Most of them are from camps of internally displaced
people dotting Assam, particularly the Kokrajhar district. Many
people in Assam have fled the area due to the fighting
That area is home to nearly a quarter of a million people who were displaced
in the late 1990s. Nearly 800 people died in ethnic fighting in Kokrajhar and
adjoining districts between Bodo tribes people and non-Bodo communities over a
decade long period from 1994. The police survey revealed an organised racket
of "recruiters" who lured good-looking women with job offers outside the state.
"We arrested some recruiters but could never put an end to the rackets
fully," said police official Anil Phukan. The modus operandi is simple: good
looking women in the displaced peoples camps are offered jobs. The parents
are paid a few thousand rupees in advance, and told the daughters will send
back money once they start working. Once they go away, that rarely happens.
Money matters Jam Singh Lakra of the Jaipur relief camp near Kokrajhar town
says: "At least 20 girls have gone away with the jobs from our camp, not to
return again." "We did identify a few recruiters
and one got beaten up. But somehow the girls kept going away." Most families
are cagey about the missing girls but some do speak up. Tuilal Mardi of
Tablegaon village says "My parents accepted the offer and sent my sister away."
"They got a few thousand rupees but she never came back or sent any money."
Professor Paula Banerjee, who studies problems faced by displaced women, says:
"Ethnic conflicts all over the world results in massive displacement of women
and that gives rise to heavy trafficking - the situation in Assam is no
different." Local pornography But not all the missing women of Assam have
been taken out of the state. Some show up in local pornographic films.
Some of the girls in the trade are from better financial backgrounds
Mala Newar in Kokrajhar was known to her teachers as a "decent, well behaved
girl" in school. That was until one of them spied on her husband's mobile
phone last month and found a video clip featuring Mala in the nude having sex
with a stranger. Inquiries in Kokrajhar revealed that Mala and some other
local girls were used in a pornographic films racket run by a local leader. A
hotel in the town was used for the filming. The girls were first lured into
the hotel with job offers, then offered soft drinks laced with sedatives.
They were then filmed in the nude and blackmailed into doing sex scenes for the
camera. Not all missing girls in Assam are from displaced peoples camps,
though. Indrani Bora and Ritu Borgohain are smart, educated English-speaking
girls from the Assamese capital, Guwahati, who got jobs in a holiday complex in
Gurgaon near Delhi seven months ago. But both say they slowly got drawn into
a call girl racket run by the complex owner. An
officer who led an Assam police team to rescue Indrani and Ritu explains.
"All across hotels and resorts in places like Delhi and Bombay, you will find
hundreds of girls from Assam and other north-eastern states working as
waitresses or customer executives. "Some do get drawn into the call-girl
trade." Hunger driven The Calcutta Research Group, in its recent study on
conflict-induced displacement says that the displaced people in Assam live in
acute poverty. Poverty is the driving force behind women opting
for the trade
The situation has led the women in particular to desperately seek work
elsewhere; even if the offers come from dubious people. "This is because the
government officials running the camps never created viable livelihood
options," says Uddipana Goswami of the Calcutta-based Centre for Studies in
Social Sciences (CSSS). Ms Goswami has worked on the displaced camps in
Assam. "Many displaced women have such exquisite craftsmanship but nobody
ever tried to convert that into income alternatives," she says. Professor
Banerjee says trafficking ignores borders therefore solutions cannot be left to
local agencies alone. "This is not a local or even a national problem."
"This reflects the global reality, so intervention by international
organisations may help check trafficking." (Names of the girls have been
changed to protect their identity.)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6430811.stm
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