Mumbai: The city of Mumbai has convicted a significant number of sex trafficking offenders, but much more has to be done to stop the different layers of racketeers involved in this crime, especially those pushing minors into prostitution, says a child rights campaigner.
The methods of sex trafficking of girls are diabolical and the only way to plug this menace is to send "a message down the line that it is going to be no cakewalk for the syndicates and gangs that operate with impunity," says Sangeeta Punekar, a social worker from Advait Foundation.
Involved in the slow healing and rehabilitation process of girls rescued by the police from traffickers, her organisation focuses with equal determination in the conviction of the accused, she says.
Based in Vasai, where a philanthropic family had donated three bungalows to house the rescued girls mostly around 20-25 at a time and aged between 13-18, the NGO also hopes to document valuable information from their work.
Little wonder that a Trafficking in Persons Report 2010 — India released by the United States Department of State, last month states that "the city of Mumbai and the state of Andhra Pradesh made significant law enforcement strides against sex trafficking, but prosecutions and convictions of sex trafficking offenders in other parts of India were minimal."
It is not clear how large the scale of sex trafficking is in India, but a counter-trafficking expert says in a book launched by the Ministry of Home Affairs, in 2009 that "it is a crime against humanity."
