These four change agents are leading the fight against trafficking of women and children in India
They faced threats, had very little or no help, but moved forward with a singular focus on their mission: to rescue trafficked women and children in India.
The statistics on sex trafficking in India are alarming. The Ministry of Women and Child Development confirmed that 19,223 women and children were trafficked in 2016, with the number increasing every year since.
But all hope of rescuing these women and children is not lost, yet. A number of women-led organisations are working hard to not only to rescue, but also rehabilitate women and children who have been trafficked. They are ensuring they are given the resources, confidence, and the ability to begin new lives.
We bring to you four women who are at the forefront, working against the sex trafficking in the country. Despite numerous challenges, threats, and lack of resources, they have a singular focus: to get trafficked women and children out of their misery and help them escape the vicious circle of trafficking.
Rescue Foundation – Triveni Balkrishna Acharya
Founded in 2000 by Triveni Balkrishna Acharya and Balkrishna Acharya, Rescue Foundation provides shelter to victims of trafficking. Triveni was a young journalist in 1993 when she first visited Kamatipura, the red-light district in Mumbai to attend a event in which actor Sunil Dutt was participating. She met three young girls, who she assumed were daughters of sex workers, but were actually victims of trafficking. She joined hands with her husband to start a shelter at their own home in the city. Soon, Balkrishna gave up his business to devote all his time to the cause. Triveni continued working as a journalist, assisting her husband during the night, rescuing young girls.
The rescued girls are provided all support so that they can go back to normal lives. The foundation has a dedicated team of 100 full-time staff, a network of more than 100 informers in place, four shelter homes in Mumbai, Pune, and Delhi, and four branch offices. It provides vocational training, psycho-social counselling, in-house schooling, access to medical facilities (including HIV treatment), post-trauma healthcare assistance, cross-border repatriation, and legal aid to prosecute the perpetrators.
Kayakalpa – Seema Waghmode
For the past 25 years, Seema Waghmode has been giving a new lease of life to commercial sex workers. It all started in 1993, where there has not much awareness of AIDS and its consequences in the country. Seema had joined the government’s research team as a nurse and conducted various awareness programmes in schools and colleges. She came across the plight of a number of sex workers trapped in lives they did not choose and from which they could not run away. She founded Kayakalpa to train a number of commercial sex workers to take up other professions. Besides this, she also organises regular health checkups, arranges counselling sessions, distributes female condoms, and educates their children. This Pune-based social worker has rehabilitated over 10,000 commercial sex workers and their children so far.
Missing – Leena Kejriwal
While growing up in Kolkata and later in her profession as a photographer, Leena Kejriwal came into contact with girls of Sonagachi, the red-light area of the city. Years later, out of her deep empathy and artistic sensibilities, it would shape complicated installations that brought up the dark realities of sex trafficking in a graphic way. But this was not enough. So she launched Missing, a project that creates awareness against trafficking for sex and engagement to provide knowledge as arsenal to women, young girls, and boys so that they can avoid becoming victims. Apart from installing public artwork on the subject Leena also launched the Missing app that takes a person through how "a missing person" feels. She goes by the mantra of "Awareness = Prevention", and marches forward with the motto, "why wait for a girl to get trafficked to save her"?
Rama Devi
Rama Devi was drugged and kidnapped from her village in Kadiri, a town in Anantapur District of Andhra Pradesh, and sold for Rs 1 lakh to a brothel in Bhiwandi near Mumbai. She along with others were beaten, with chilli paste smeared on their eyes, and they were tortured to keep them from raising their voices or asking to be let free. The nightmare continued for a year, when they were finally sent back to Anantapur because they felt she and another woman were influencing the others to rebel against the brothel owners. She recovered slowly and resolved to rescue others from the same brothel. With the help of NGO Rural & Environmental Development Society (REDS), she decided to take legal action against the traffickers. After facing a number of hurdles, the three traffickers were convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison and charged a fine of Rs 50,000. Her mission did not end there. Rama Devi, with the help of C Bhanuja of REDS, and the police managed to rescue 30 other girls from Bhiwandi.
Also read: This NGO's mobile library instills the passion for reading in children of Kolkata's sex workers