Your Excellency

The Honourable Prime Minister of India,

The Honourable Home Minister of India,

And concerned department heads,

I am writing to you as someone who cares deeply about India and its reputation in the international community.I am appalled by the phenomenon of human trafficking in our great nation India. Millions of women and children have been smuggled into the country to “work” as sex slaves. These women and children are beaten, raped, starved and caged. The peace making nation India cannot and must not allow slavery to exist within its borders.

Women and girls are trafficked within the country for the purposes of forced prostitution. Religious pilgrimage centers and cities popular for tourism continue to be vulnerable to child sex tourism. Indian nationals engage in child sex tourism within the country and, to a lesser extent, in other countries. Sex trafficking in some large cities continued to move from red light areas to road side small hotels, and private apartments. Women and girls from Nepal and Bangladesh are also subjected to sex trafficking in India. Maoist armed groups known as the Naxalites forcibly recruited children into their ranks.

The US Department of State report which was published in UNHCR – The UN refugee agency states that “India is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking. The forced labor of millions of its citizens constitutes India's largest trafficking problem; men, women, and children in debt bondage are forced to work in industries such as brick kilns, rice mills, agriculture, and embroidery factories. A common characteristic of bonded labor is the use of physical and, in many instances, sexual violence–including rape–as coercive tools, in addition to debt, to maintain these victims' labor.”

The government must make this issue a national priority. More resources need to be dedicated to cracking down on perpetrators, assisting victims and preventing the continued smuggling of women and children across the border.

“Cases aren’t taken so seriously. There is no fear of the law.”

As a member of the Indian community, I call upon the government of India to step up its efforts to fight this atrocity. India must invest greater time and resources to become a world leader in the fight to end modern slavery and to protect its unique culture, humanity and ethical democracy.I urge you to use every opportunity to help raise this issue to the top of the national agenda.

A society is judged best by how it treats its marginalised, its young and its old. In the case of India, more than half the population is under the age of 25. The time is ripe for India to use its current fury to usher in measures to properly protect its young.

Sincerely,

An Indian citizen

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