North East has emerged as hub of human trafficking in India : Mir

Shillong, Sep 23 Sep 23 (IANS) Meghalaya High Court Chief Justice Mohammad Yaqoob Mir said India's North East has emerged as hub of human trafficking in India where unemployment, poverty, migration for search of jobs are some of the reasons of human trafficking, an official statement said on Sunday.

"Introspection is required to meet the challenge of human trafficking," he said delivering a key-note address at the 2nd Regional Consultation on Child Right in the Context of Human Trafficking (sex & bonded labour) in North East India here in Meghalaya on Saturday.

Voicing concern on the human trafficking, the Chief Justice called for collective responsibility of stakeholders, state legal services authority and police to take care of the rights of the children and save them from being exploited.

Noting that Assam has the highest number of trafficking cases in the country with 1494 cases, Mir said Assam accounts for 22 per cent of the total reported cases of trafficking as per report released by National Crime Records Bureau 2015.

"Assam with protracted insurgency problem coupled with recurrent flood, peculiar geographical setting has made it vulnerable to infiltration," he added.

Mir said Meghalaya has the largest number of child trafficking in the coal mines areas of Jaintia Hills after Assam.

"Thousands of children are working in hazardous conditions in the coal mines," the Chief Justice said.

Praising Mizoram for being the first North Eastern state to formulate the Victim of Crime Compensation Scheme, Mir said that in spite of these novel measures, human trafficking is still active in the state.

On Manipur scenario, Mir said the state has emerged as the new source of cross border human trafficking in India and also being used as an easy transit route.

Delivering special address, Gauhati High Court AChief Justice (Acting) Arup Kumar Goswami, said child rights and human trafficking are concepts which are opposite pole as trafficking crushes the rights of a child.

Goswami urged the legal services authority and NGOs to isolate the pockets where trafficking is taking place and create general awareness which in turn will perhaps reduce human trafficking to some extent.

The consultation was organized by International Justice Mission (IJM) & North East for Child Rights under the aegis of the Nagaland State Legal Services Authority (NSLSA) and Meghalaya State Legal Services Authority (MSLSA).

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