An annual report released by Maiti Nepal has painted a gloomy picture of the status of women and girls in Nepali society, calling for effective intervention to dismantle transnational human trafficking networks and ensure safe migration.

 

“Despite the enactment of the Human Trafficking and Transportation (Control) Act-2007 and Human Trafficking and Transportation (Control) Rules-2008 by the Government of Nepal, the lack of effective implementation of laws and awareness-raising programmes has resulted in spread of the trafficking ring deep and far instead of controlling this scourge,” read an excerpt of the 2015 Report on Trafficking in Persons.

 

According to the report, Maiti Nepal filed as many as 44 cases of human trafficking in various district courts through the concerned district police office and the Central Investigation Bureau as of today in 2015.

It constitutes 15 per cent increase in reported cases of human trafficking when compared to the last year.

Anuradha Koirala, founder of Maiti Nepal, said she was concerned about the changing dimension of the transnational crime. “There was a time when Nepali women and girls trafficked by organised crime syndicates used to end up in the Indian cities of New Delhi and Mumbai.

 

Now it has been expanded to Nagpur, Assam and Pune as well. The web of trafficking for worst forms of slavery and sexual exploitation has gradually spread to the Gulf, Western Asia and Africa under the cloak of foreign employment.”

 

She underscored the need to make foreign employment policy more effective for safe migration and enter into bilateral agreemenst with destination countries for rescue, repatriation and rehabilitation of the victims, while guaranteeing their rights to life in foreign countries. “I would also like to urge the government to make the outsourcing business systematic and transparent, as it is also adding to the rise of trafficking in persons,” said Koirala.

 

Bearing this in mind, police had recently launched a massive crackdown on suspected marriage bureaus, educational consultancies and outsourcing agencies. Human traffickers have been capitalising on the geophysics of the country, lack of employment opportunity, low education level and poverty to lure women and girls into foreign countries with the promise of lucrative job and better future.

 

The victims feel cheated only when they are left to fend for themselves in a foreign land. It is the second largest criminal industry after drug trafficking.