Hyderabad: The kingpins of the human trafficking rackets plaguing the city go scot-free with the police focus on small, local sub-agents.
Meanwhile, many women continue to be trafficked to Gulf countries on tourist visas, to work as housemaids there. Over the past two years, nearly 25 cases have been registered at various police stations in the city. A majority of the cases have been reported in the south zone, which comprises the old city and its extensions.
So far, the police has only managed to round up local agents, who are usually poor, unemployed youth who are lured into the business with promises of commissions. They are usually paid between Rs 20,000 and Rs 30,000. M. Bheem Reddy, from the Migrants Rights Council, says, “Many of the local agents are semi-literate men living in the slum areas. They are asked to convince the families of women to send them abroad.”
Abid Rasool Khan, the former chairman of the Telangana State Minorities Commission, says, “None of the main agents involved in these cases has been arrested in past two years. Unless the police tighten the noose around them, the exploitation of women will not stop.”
Amjed Ullah Khan, the leader of the Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT), says that the police is delaying the registration of cases saying the offence did not take place in India. “The police point out that the women are being tortured in a Gulf country, and that they have no jurisdiction. Only after influential persons take up the do the police round up local agents,” he says. He adds that when the police register cases of cheating against local agents, they manage to obtain bail within a day.
A police team from a station in the south zone had gone to Mumbai a few months ago, to investigate a case.
According to sources, they returned empty-handed after their counterparts in Mumbai failed to provide them any support.
A police official, on condition of anonymity, says that the agents in Mumbai enjoy political patronage and are well connected.
