Many of us have heard of child and women trafficking but when have we heard of it taking place in Vellore? A Teluge daily “Eenadu” published a news article on March 4th (in their Tamilnadu edition) quoting police records. Six bus stands are quoted namely Koyambedu, Vellore, Trichy, Salem, Coimbator and Madurai from where more than 1000 women and children are abducted each year.
Here is a paper clipping. Enlarge the article and then read if you can in Telugu. I have given the numbers and also my thoughts below if you cannot read the article.
The numbers are as follows:
2007: 1097
2008: 1155
2009: 1133
If you do the math for averages, it comes to be about 15 girls/ women per bus stand per month. Yes, that’s about one individual every second day from each bus stand to force them into prostitution. That’s awful number of people being abducted.
Article also says that more than 50% of them are children between 12-15 years of age and of all the kidnappings, about 75% of them are being taken from the bus stands.
Is there anything that you and I can do to curb this menace in Vellore? Of all the bus stands listed, only the city of Vellore doesn’t have a children emergency phone line called ‘Childline 1098’. We must demand the government that they implement Childline 1098 service immediately in Vellore. Then we all must become vigilant to keep our eyes and ears open to see if there are any children/ women that are suspected to be victims of trafficking and must report to the appropriate authorities.
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