An 18-year old tribal girl Sunita Kumari (name changed)
helped the Delhi police conduct raids on an illegal placement agency in
Taimur Nagar near New Friends Colony (NFC) a year after she had been
trafficked from Jharkhand to Delhi to work in the city. Earlier, this
week the girl had travelled from Khunti in Jharkhand to Delhi with
officials of Anti Human Trafficking Unit of her home district to help
identify the personnel running the placement agency Mamta Placement
Agency.
“Initially, Mukesh who ran the agency treated
me alright and gave me responsibilities of staff at the agency. My work
consisted of accompanying the girls and boys – many of them minors - to
houses where we had placed them as domestic workers. But a few months
later, Mukesh confiscated my mobile phone and broke it. When I said I
wanted to leave, he threatened me saying he had all my school documents
such as my class X certificates etc. Then I decided to plan an escape
and also get my certificates back from him somehow,” said Sunita.
She
said she had travelled from Delhi to Bihar with the other staff of the
placement agency to a village they were visiting in Banke and fled from
there to return to her village in Jharkhand. Three months after
returning home, she approached the district labour department of the
district and made a complaint about the Delhi-based placement agency.
The labour department directed her to the district Anti Human
Trafficking Unit and she traveled to Delhi with police officials and NGO
Diya Sewa Sansathan.
“I had worked briefly as a
housekeeper at a hotel in Bangalore and there I had learned that Labour
Department is meant to assist workers who feel cheated. I had remembered
that and complained at the district level” said Sunita. She said that
she had left her home in Torpa in Khunti after she failed to clear class
XII examinations in 2013. “When I took the police to the agency's
address, I knew they will try to threaten me but I will make sure I get
my wage dues back as well,” she said.
Sunita Kumari said she had already applied to appear for class XII examinations in her home district again.
Three persons were arrested from the placement agency premises, though the manager Mukesh Kumar was still absconding.
The
National Commission for Women had proposed a draft Regulation of
Employment Agencies 2007 but it is yet to be accepted and there are no
national laws governing the placement agencies at present. Rishikant of
NGO Shakti Vahini who was part of the team that went along with the
police for the raid said there was a need for a policy on domestic
workers.
“It is commendable that this girl was
willing to come all the way from another state to Delhi to give
information on her employer and she was so keen to get her school
certificates back. We will extend to her all help in getting her wages
back as well,” said Inspector Aradhana Singh of Anti Human Trafficking
Unit.
When I
said I wanted to leave, he(Mukesh) threatened me saying he had all my
school documents etc. Then I decided to escape and also get my
certificates back
Sunita Kumari (name changed)