Girl, 16, escapes sex traffic ring run by husband, 55

Dubai: A minor Indian girl took a grocer’s help to escape from a prostitution ring allegedly run by her 55-year-old Arab husband in Ras Al Khaimah, XPRESS can reveal.

The 16-year-old girl, who hails from the Indian state of Hyderabad, married the Arab man in her home country earlier this year, but it wasn’t until four months later that she could finally come to the UAE.

Sources familiar with the case told XPRESS the girl’s parents took Dh30,000 from the bridegroom in exchange for their daughter’s hand.

Dashed dreams

However, the girl’s dreams of marital bliss became a nightmare when her husband reportedly asked her to sleep with other men. When she refused, she was threatened and locked up in a Ras Al Khaimah villa.

Luckily, last fortnight a grocery owner visited the villa to deliver some goods and the girl told him her plight.

The quick-thinking grocer called a taxi and helped the girl escape. The taxi took her to the Indian Consulate in Dubai where officials arranged to send her back to India. The Consulate refused to comment. “With reference to the case of a minor Hyderabadi girl, the Consulate has no comment,” said Ahshish Gupta, Consul (Consular and Head of Chancery) in an email to XPRESS on Wednesday.