The Centre has decided to introduce a new law to curb human trafficking. The law is proposed to serve as a one-stop solution to deal with trafficking faced by women, children and juveniles for prostitution, bonded labour and organ trade.
The draft legislation will be ready in six months, said the Centre in an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court in response to a PIl by NGO Prajwala. The PIl underlined the need for a comprehensive legislation to tackle exploitation of women and children who get trafficked not just for prostitution but other purposes such as organ trade, bonded labour, domestic servants, etc.
A Committee headed by Secretary, Ministry of Women and Child Development is working on the task since November 16, 2015 following the approval of the Cabinet Secretariat. This is the second major step taken by Government to curb trafficking after Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) constituted a Central body called Organised Crime Investigation Agency (OCIA) to exclusively deal with human trafficking cases. The Centre informed that this body will be operational by December 1 next year.
At present, the laws under which trafficking is punishable falls under Indian Penal Code Sections 370 (trafficking for purpose of exploitation), 370A (engaging minors for sexual exploitation), 372 (selling of girls for prostitution), 373 (buying of girls for prostitution), 366A (procuring minor girls), 366B (importing girls from foreign countries). Besides, there are special laws such as Immoral Trafficking (Prevention) Act, Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, Protection of Children Against Sexual Offences Act, Bonded labour System (Abolition) Act, Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) Act, Child labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, and Transplantation of Human Organs Act.
On October 13, 2015, when the matter was last discussed in Supreme Court, the bench of Justices AR Dave, Madan B lokur and Kurian Joseph had shared their anxiety on the subject sharing how various laws dealt with sexual exploitation of women and children without focusing on their trade or sale. The bench proposed a comprehensive law to help law enforcement agencies to detect and prosecute offenders and to make available a database of organised crime syndicates involved in trafficking. Satisfied by the Centre’s response, the Court disposed the PIl.
The affidavit of the Centre informed that Cabinet Secretary gave approval to the WCD Ministry on November 12 following which the Committee was formed.
The MHA will prepare a list of legislations impacting trafficking and also devise a victim-centric Protocol spelling out rehabilitation and resettlement of victims.
In addition, the MHA is also working on the fine print of OCIA, which will be the first-ever centralized agency to investigate human trafficking cases having inter-state and international ramifications. A victim database will be prepared by the agency that will be involved with surveillance and intelligence gathering to bring down the rising number of trafficking cases. It will require an annual budget of less than Rs100 crore.
As per NCRB data, under Section 370 and 370A of IPC, there are 774 and 151 cases registered this year till September. This figure itself is alarming as in 2014, under these heads, 562 and 105 cases were registered.