sunderblogger-blogpost.130114a

MANY OF INDIA’S ENSLAVED HAVE NOT BEEN MOVED FROM ONE PLACE TO ANOTHER – THEY ARE ENSLAVED IN THEIR OWN VILLAGES Reports consistently note that India’s most significant challenge is the high number of Indian citizens in various forms of modern slavery within India’s borders. For example, the 2013 US TIP Report that suggests ninety per cent of trafficking in India is internal.7 Some of these results from internal migration, as migrants can originate from poor rural communities, lured to relatively wealthier cities by brokers on the false presence of employment. Internally trafficked men, women and children make up significant shares of the workforce in construction, textiles, brick making, mines, fish and prawn processing and hospitality.8 However it is important to note that many of India’s enslaved have not been moved from one place to another – they are enslaved in their own villages. Many are trapped in debt bondage to a local landowner or born into slavery because of caste, customary, social and hereditary obligations. Forced labor has been identified in factory work, agriculture, brick making, mining and quarrying, the textiles and garments industries, domestic work, and forced begging. Bonded labor, whether through debt or other forms of ‘bondage’ of workers, is rife in stone quarries, brick kilns, construction and mining.9 The difficulty for internal migrant workers in accessing protections and government entitlements, such as the food rations card, which is based on a worker’s residence, is thought to increase vulnerability to exploitation.10 Likewise for those enslaved in their own area, corruption or non-performance of safety nets (such as the National Employment Guarantee, food rations, primary health care and pensions) and practices of land grabbing and asset domination by high caste groups (or for commercial development) leaves people without protections. Some of those affected by slavery in India do not officially exist – they have no birth registration or ID so it can be hard for them to access protective entitlements. Kind Regards! Sunder T