HUMAN TRAFFICKING: SALE OF HUMANITY
HUMAN TRAFFICKING : SALE OF HUMANITY
Human Trafficking is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of people through force, fraud or deception, with the aim of exploiting them for profit. Men, women and children of all ages and from all backgrounds can become victims of this crime, which occurs in every region of the world. The traffickers often use violence or fraudulent employment agencies and fake promises of education and job opportunities to trick and coerce their victims.
The crime of human trafficking consists of three core elements: the act, the means, the purpose. Physical and sexual abuse, blackmail, emotional manipulation, and the removal of official documents are used by traffickers to control their victims. Exploitation can take place in a victim's home country, during migration or in a foreign country.
(SOURCE: United Nations)
TRAFFICKING OF WOMEN
Trafficking of women is an international commercial activity in which force, coercion, and fraud are used to transport women and children across international boundaries for economic gain. As a complex organized criminal activity, human trafficking is comparable to the trafficking of drugs and weapons, but it is more profitable and less risky because many forms of the trade appear legitimate. Within the global practice of human trafficking, 70 percent of the victims are women and 50 percent are children under age eighteen. Estimates of the number of women and children trafficked each year range from 700,000 to four million, and annual profits are estimated at $7 billion. Demand for human trafficking is driven by a need for cheap labor in factories, households, agricultural industries, and the sex industry. Globalization has facilitated business between traders in and consumers of trafficked humans.
Trafficked women come from less wealthy countries in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe the former Soviet Union, Latin America the Middle East, and the Caribbean. In some of those areas, such as the Philippines and Thailand, the sex tourism industry has increased demand for women and thus the amount of trafficking to meet the needs of men who travel from Europe, North America, and Australia. In the United States an estimated 50,000 women are trafficked in each year, coming mostly from the former Soviet Union and Southeast Asia. Many women leave the Ukraine because of difficult socioeconomic conditions that predominantly affect women, who constitute 75 percent of the unemployed there. In Asia, Japan is the largest market for trafficked women. In China the one-child rule and a preference for male children have resulted in an imbalanced ratio of males to females. As of 2000 males outnumbered females born between 1980 and 2000 by 8.5 million. Those men create a demand for wives and sex industry workers that often are filled by national and international trafficking of women from nearby countries such as Vietnam.
INTERNATIONAL LAWS GOVERNING TRAFFICKING OF WOMEN
Because trafficking of women is an international business, individual countries are challenged to create legislation to deter and punish that trade. In 2000 the United States passed the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act, which specified actions to punish traffickers and assist victims within the United States and to urge foreign countries to eliminate trafficking, address the economic conditions that lead to trafficking, and assist victims who are repatriated. The United Nations (UN) has several protocols aimed at halting human trafficking. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child from 1989 focuses particularly on guaranteeing human rights to children, and the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons from 2000 defines trafficking, outlines punishments for traffickers, and requires states that ratify it to protect and assist trafficked persons. In 2002 the United States implemented a special "T" visa that allows victims to remain in the country if they testify against their traffickers and face likely danger in their home countries.
Many countries have no laws against trafficking; one is South Africa, a popular source and destination for trafficked persons from at least ten other countries, including Mozambique, Thailand, and China. In addition to legal action some governments and nongovernmental organizations have launched educational campaigns both to inform women from popular source countries about the dangers of trafficking and to encourage citizens of destination countries to be watchful for immigrants who may be victims of that industry.
(SOURCE: international organization on migration and United Nations.)
CONCERNS ON WOMEN TRAFFICKING IN INDIA :
Trafficking is prohibited by the Constitution of India. Yet India is a source, destination and transit country for human trafficking primarily for commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor, and with the falling sex ratio, trafficking for marriage is becoming another pull factor for trafficking of women and girls. The pernicious system of bonded labor continues despite legislation to combat it.
Women and girls in India may be trafficked due to cultural practices such as the devadasi system though banned or due to poverty. There are again many women who willingly migrate to the Middle East, Europe and the United States to work as domestic labor who are defrauded by placement agencies and sometimes trafficked. Men, women and children are trafficked within India and abroad and kept in conditions of involuntary servitude with characteristics such as withholding payment of wages, confiscation of travel documents, non adherence to conditions of work, inordinate profits to middlemen with bonded labor to pay off the profits/ charges, etc. Bonded labor within the country is serious problem.
India is also a destination country for persons from Bangladesh and Nepal, and a bulk of those trafficked from these countries is women and children. In both cases, the initial migration, legal or illegal, may be voluntary, and subsequently migrants may be trafficked. The numbers are very large, though precise figures are lacking and need to be tackled urgently. Voluntary, and subsequently migrants may be trafficked. The numbers are very large, though precise figures are lacking and need to be tackled urgently.
CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS ON TRAFFICKING AND PROTECTION
India has addressed trafficking both directly and indirectly in its Constitution. There are three Articles spread over Fundamental Rights in Part III and Directive Principles of State Policy in Part IV which address trafficking related issues.
A) Article 23 Fundamental Right prohibiting trafficking in human beings and forms of forced labor.
B) Article 39(e) Directive Principle of State Policy directed at ensuring that health and strength of individuals are not abused and that no one is forced by economic necessity to do work unsuited to their age or strength.
C) Article 39(f) Directive Principle of State Policy stating that childhood and youth should be protected against exploitation.
IMMORAL TRAFFIC PREVENTION ACT ,1956
India’s immoral traffic prevention act,1956 is the only legislation specifically addressing trafficking. However, it does mix up issues of trafficking and prostitution and is currently pending amendment. It penalizes trafficking of women and children for commercial sexual exploitation. Keeping a brothel is a punishable offence, as is living on the earnings of the prostitution of others. The latter would inadvertently also cover family members or dependants of the women, which was not the intention of legislation. There have been cases at times where the trafficked women herself had been charged under this provision.
GAPS IN THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK OF TRAFFICKING IN INDIA
There are two classifications under which gaps have been studied first, under the Prosecution Protection-Prevention matrix and second, under the Protocol, testing gaps with specific Articles.
Gaps Examined within the Prosecution-Protection-Prevention Matrix
Key gaps in the legal framework have an impact on all three areas of prosecution, protection and prevention. These include:
1. Non-ratification of UNTOC and Protocols, which is a major stumbling block as many enabling provisions of the treaties cannot be availed of.
2. Lack of a comprehensive definition of trafficking either as a common minimum platform for the States to work on with each other, or even for punishing all forms of trafficking within the countries. While the SAARC definition is there, it is limited to trafficking for sexual exploitation and only covers women and children. While there is a definition in the Goa Children's Act,2003 this only covers children and is not applicable beyond the boundaries of the State.
3. Gender sensitivity is missing; even though there are laws for women, this does not translate into a sensitive law. There are provisions in the ITPA, which penalize the victim, for instance.
KEY GAPS IN PROSECUTION
1. There is no uniform definition of who is a child/ minor in terms of age. It varies in different statutes; both civil, e.g., marriage or labor, and criminal, e.g., trafficking. Even within fields of law like labor law, the definitions of a child/ minor vary according to the legislation.
2. Trafficking is not often seen as an organized crime, and provisions relevant to organized crime are not made use of in trafficking cases
Cooperation mechanisms are ad hoc or non-existent, as far as cross border trafficking is
Concerned. Especially concerning:
a. Legal assistance
b. Providing information
c. Transfer of sentenced persons
d. Joint investigations
Prosecutions overall are not satisfactory.
Key Gaps In Protection
1. There is sometimes no adequate distinction drawn between the trafficker and the victims; e.g., in the case of prostitution or in the case of unsafe migration without documents. Sections 4 and 8 of the ITPA have been used against the victim herself in some cases. '
2.There is no positive duty cast upon States to provide sufficient shelters or for rehabilitation or rescue although enabling provisions exist in a number of legislations such as the ITPA' and the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000.'' The conditions in the homes that do exist need improvement."
3. Civil remedies in tort law are not used against employers who violate labor standards or force employment, though remedies are available in the Criminal Procedure Code and as established by case law, and though there are a number of initiatives now being taken on bonded labor.
4. Financial support for existing programs is often insufficient.
5. A conducive atmosphere to make it safe for victims to testify is not created. There is no witness Protection program too. Many witnesses turn hostile as a result. The lengthy proceedings and Delays add to this.
6. The proceedings are not often gender sensitive and a woman victim is often unaware of Proceedings in her own case. She is not involved, nor does she have the services of legal Counsel to advise her. Women victims may also be put into protective homes against their will and separated from their children.
(SOURCE: data excerpts from United Nations repot from human trafficking in south Asia and India)
RECOMMENDATIONS TO TACKLE HUMAN TRAFFICKING
1. There must be a greater sensitivity to the violations of rights by women who have been trafficked. The woman must have a say in legal proceedings pertaining to her matter. Women should not be forced into homes or separated from their children and families. Cases are not always taken up in designated courts dealing with violence against women.
2. There must be a greater sensitivity to the violations of rights by women who have been trafficked. The woman must have a say in legal proceedings pertaining to her matter. Women should not be forced into homes or separated from their children and families. Cases are not always taken up in designated courts dealing with violence against women
3. Trafficking must be seen as an organized crime in criminal procedure and substantive criminal law. Existing principles, such as common intention, conspiracy, etc., must be used in cases of trafficking.
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