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Impoverished
Nepalese girls tricked into prostitution
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BANKE,
22 August 2007 (IRIN)
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Traffickers target Nepalese girls from poor families in the villages
| Sixteen-year-old
Sushma does not want to reveal her true identity for fear that the traffickers
who sold her into the notorious brothel area of Kamathipura in Mumbai,
India, could track her down and kill her.
"I
should have listened to my village schoolteacher who told me not to be
taken in by false promises of a job abroad," she told IRIN, expressing
regret that she had left her village in Banke, nearly 600km southwest of
Kathmandu, without even informing her parents. |
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"There
are so many innocent village girls who have been lured by traffickers with
false promises of earning a lot of money in a foreign country," said Sushma.
Anti
girl-trafficking activists have asked the local police authorities, especially
those stationed near the open Nepal-Indian border, to be on the lookout
for any young underage girls leaving the country.
In
the last week alone a prominent local non-governmental organisation (NGO),
Maiti Nepal, intercepted around 15 girls, half of whom were underage. "They
were all carrying fake passports and didn't even know where they were travelling
to," said activist Keshab Koirala from Maiti Nepal in Banke.
Maiti
Nepal and other NGOs like the Women's Rehabilitation Centre are actively
raising awareness of the dangers of trafficking but the traffickers can
be persuasive: "I trusted the man who came to help me but I didn't know
he was tricking me," said Fudoma Sherpa, a 15-year-old girl who was saved
by Maiti Nepal at the border near Nepalgunj in Banke District. The alleged
trafficker is in hiding, according to activists.
Despite
measures by the government and NGOs to protect girls from being trafficked,
the situation has barely changed, according to activists, who said hundreds
of Nepalese girls still get trafficked to India every year where they are
forced into prostitution.
NGOs
suspect that one of the reasons for the steady number of trafficked girls
is that mobility restrictions imposed by the recent armed conflict in Nepal
now no longer exist. During that period young girls could not easily leave
the villages due to the Maoist rebels who controlled the movement of people.
The traffickers are able to exploit this situation, they say.
Particularly
vulnerable are girls who have become internally displaced persons (IDPs)
due to growing political violence in southern Nepal's densely populated
Terai region.
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How
the traffickers operate
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| According
to Maiti Nepal, traffickers have been luring girls into prostitution by
offering them fake jobs in Gulf countries and southeast Asia. The NGO says
most of the vulnerable girls are under 16.
Investigations
by the NGO have revealed that the Nepalese brothel owners in India use
their strong networks at village and city level in Nepal to ensure a steady
supply of girls. The local traffickers get a cut from the brothel owners. |
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Young
Nepalese girls are sold at a high price to the biggest brothel owners.
One of the most notorious brothel owners was released a few years ago due
to her political connections, which proved that traffickers get political
protection, according to Maiti Nepal.
top
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Impoverished
rural women prone to exploitation in towns
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KATHMAMDU,
12 June 2007 (IRIN)
| Maili
Buda, 35, is having an increasingly difficult life since her husband was
killed in Khalanga village, northwest of the capital, during a clash between
the Maoist rebels and government security forces nearly six years ago.
Peace
has been restored in the country but many Nepalese women like Buda remain
impoverished, say local aid workers.
"Women
continue to get poorer by the day and their hardship is compounded by the
government's neglect," said local development worker Jiwan Khadga. |
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He
said many impoverished women lost their male relatives during fighting
with the Maoists or when they migrated to India to escape the turmoil.
"A large number of them didn't return home. They stayed in India and some
remarried, even when their wives were waiting for them."
Lack
of rights
"The
worst off are women, and their impoverished situation is exacerbated by
their lack of rights to own property and land," said Biswo Khadka, director
of Maiti Nepal, a prominent organisation helping to protect impoverished
women from being trafficked or forced into prostitution.
Girls
not spared by violence in Terai
Nepal
has introduced laws to ensure equal property rights for women but these
are not enforced in the villages.
"We
will have to launch a massive campaign to persuade the government to give
us its attention," said 36-year old Rabina Regmi, who was displaced from
her home in the remote Ramechap District, nearly 200km east of the capital,
after her husband was killed by Maoists.
Today
she lives in abject poverty in the capital in a small one-room flat with
her five children. Her relatives denied her the right to inherit her husband's
property and literally forced her out of her house.
Exploited
If
the women try to find work in urban areas they can end up in very vulnerable
situations and either get underpaid or are sexually exploited, according
to Maiti Nepal. The fact that most are also illiterate or semi-literate
exacerbates the situation. Nearly 65 percent of Nepalese women are illiterate.
''Women
continue to get poorer by the day and their hardship is compounded by the
government's neglect.''
"I
had no choice but to work in this dirty environment," said Rita Biswakarma,
a 25-year-old waitress in a cabin restaurant, where she often has to endure
sexual harassment and even have paid sex with customers. Many village girls
working in Kathmandu are tricked into working as waitresses and then forced
into providing sexual services.
Fighting
between government troops and rebels forced Biswakarma and her two children
to flee their village in the poverty-stricken Nuwakot District, about 100km
north of Kathmandu, nearly two years ago. Her husband also fled.
Some
of the poorest people live in remote hill and mountainous areas in the
western part of the country, according to the UN's International Fund for
Agricultural Development (IFAD). These areas have low rainfall, poor soil,
and few roads or markets. Water supply, health, education and sanitation
services are virtually non-existent, according to IFAD.
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Source:IRIN 2007
Copyright
© UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2007
[
This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]
Integrated
Regional Information Networks (IRIN), part of the UN Office for the Coordination
of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). |
| more information |
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Links
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External
Links |
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Maiti
Nepal
Against
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