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NEPAL'S SEX TRADE VICTIMS |
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Women and young girls from Nepal have become the latest victims of one of the fastest-growing areas of international criminal activity - human trafficking and sexual exploitation. An estimated 12,000 Nepalese women are annually smuggled to India's sex industry in Bombay, making Nepal one of the largest "countries of origin" for human trafficking. An open border between India and Nepal of nearly 1,000 miles facilitates what critics call a modern form of slavery, one which they say is abetted by corrupt police. |
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Nepali Flag |
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In the absence of travel documentation, trafficking occurs under the very glare of police checkpoints, many times by bribing border officials. Traffickers, mostly agents of Indian brothel owners, attend local Nepalese festivals and scout for vulnerable girls whom they can sell for an average of $200 per girl. In the majority opf cases, girl 9 years old or older are trafficked across the border by these middlemen, who promise lucrative factory jobs and a big city life to the girl's family. Desperate to break free from poverty, the girls are sold by their fathers, brothers or uncles for a few hundred to a thousand dollars, only to end up as bonded prostitutes in India's brothels.
In many cases, parents are unaware that they are unwittingly selling their daughters to the sex trade. Many Nepali families are so poor that they contract their dauthers to employers, not realizing that the girls will end up as prostitutes outside of Nepal. |
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Lack of education leads to low awarness of the whole issue among women, their family members and the community as a whole. This poses problems for the girls since they are not aware of the nature of people they are talking to. Just 27% of Nepalese women are literate, compared with 52 % of men, according to recent statistics. Economically handicaped, the girls depend on the brothel owner for the food and clothing and are not permitted to refuse customers. Once sold to brothels, each girl is "forced to serve an average of 14 clients per day, with minimum of three and maximum of 40 persons."
Nepalese girls in Indian brothels live in perpetual fear of imprisonment and are beaten, not just physically, but they also endure extreme psychological and mental abuse. They are especially vulnerable to HIV/AIDS or other sexually transmitted diseases. In 2000, an estimated 72% of Nepalese prostitutes under 18 years old who were working in India had contracted the virus that causes AIDS. Indian and Nepali men beleive that sexual intercourse with young virgin women will cure them of sexually transmitted diseases... |
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