Wife, domestic servant, slave !!!

Report on Trafficking of Women and Children in Pakistan by Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid

Graphics--

Before the women and children can get to Pakistan, the agents charge a fee ranging from US$ 145 to US$ 435 for their "service" of taking them across the sub-continent. Though this is an extortionate amount for a family whose life long savings total that much, they raise the requisite amount of money, considering it an investment for a happier future.

Some of the trafficked women and children are abducted from outside their homes. Young girls report of teenage boys lurking outside their schools, befriending them and eventually taking them on an "adventure". They realise, just a little too late, that they have been deceived by the boy, who is usually an agent. A small number of trafficked women claim to have been physically forced to travel with an agent or to have been drugged and rendered unconcious during the journey to India or Pakistan.

Typically, the original contact with a woman or her family is made by one person in a network fo agents, who has arrived in the community earlier and established his or her trustworthiness. These initial agents seek out vulnerable members of the community and persuade them that a better life awaits them elsewhere. A few women narrated tales of other women becoming their "best friends" or even sisters and then promising to take them "sightseeing" to India or Pakistan or even offering them a job there. However, these "adventures" and "sightseeing" tours actually turn into nightmares for them.

The pimps can be Bangladeshi, India or Pakistani. They are organised and have an extensive network throughout the sub-continent. Their strong links with the law enforcement agencies allow them to get away with the heinous deed. After picking up their charge they take them to the main city, usually Dacca, and onward to the Indian border. In India, the group travels to a major city, such as New Delhi, where some of the women are given temporary work before being transported to Pakistan. Another journey takes the agent(s) and the remaining women to the Indian border with Pakistan. In Pakistan almost all trafficked women are taken through Lahore, to Karachi, the largest population centre in Pakistan and also the most profitable market for them.

During the journey husbands are beaten up and separated from their wives, and fathers from their children, by the pimps. Crying infants are considered burdensome and are left behind to die. The women and children are made to walk long distances by foot with no medication available for the ailing members. The children are forced to bear the heat of the day and the cold of the night. The women and children are forced to endure all the hardships confronting them.

The involvement of the law enforcing agencies, primarily the border guards, further exacerbates the plight of the trafficked women and children. According to a March 1994, Sindh Police Report (hereinafter Police Report), borders in South Asia are generally porous, where some borders remain entirely uncontrolled. Furthermore, governments lack the administrative, military or political will to enforce rules of entry. However, the administration's inaction extends beyond mere passive indifference and apathy in enforcing rules of entry. Some women report that the pimps openly give the border force money to let them pass.

The illegal border crossing occurs only a night. Noor Jehan, the wife of a pimp reported on how the border officials and guards are involved in the entire racket:

"There were fifty to sixty girls and about twenty-five men...We crossed the border from Beenapur to Amritsar and from there to Lahore in the dark by foot. We were taken to a secluded place in a jungle before crossing the border, under police custody, and asked to stay there until dark. The border officials kept the girls who were pretty... sexually abused them... kept them until the next lot of girls arrived and then the previous ones were released."

Once in Karachi, the women and children are kept in Bengali "paras" (slums). The main Bengali paras are in Ayesha Manzil, Federal B Area, North Karachi, Nazimabad, Gulshan-e-Iqbal and Machar Colony. The names of the pimps involved have been identified and are known to the police. However, few have been arrested and none prosecuted.

In the Bengali paras, trafficked women and children are confined to dens being closely monitored by the pimps who are assisted by their wives and daughters. They are kept in crowded rooms and deprived of proper food and clothing. They are forced to do chores in the den and are beaten if they refuse to cooperate. In the mean time, the pimp arranges a buyer. Each sale earns him between US$ 200 and US$229 net on the average and the pimp makes approximately 120 to 125 such sales in a month. The bigger pimps employ an intermediary pimp to make the sales for them, where the latter makes US$15 average commission on every sale. The sale price of the women (generally ranging from US$ 1285 to US$ 2428) depends on her age, beauty, virginity, education, etc. These figures are obtained from interviews of victims and are corroborated by the occasional pimp or his co-conspirator.

The humiliating procedure used by the pimps to sell the ...young girls, was documented by an undercover reporter fo the Urdu daily newspaper, Jang.

The "commodity" is paraded in front of the buyers, each and every physical attribute of the woman is appraised according to the buyer's needs, skills are assessed and the bargaining begins. Eventually the women are auctioned off into servitude. If not right away, after a number of similar demanding and degrading displays.

 A farcical "nikah" (registered marriage) takes place and the buyer actually marries the purchased woman, thus legalizing her enslavement. The husband then either sells her to someone else and makes a tidy profit for himself or keeps her in a brothel so that she may become a permanent source of income. Alternatively, he may make her a labourer in the fields and the house.

Once sold or married off, the women are either forced into working at brothels, or... relegated to a life of domestic labour.

Many of the women and girls serve as domestic servants... Since there are no specific laws in Pakistan regulating this informal work sector, the employers take license to subject their employees to various forms of abuse. Though criminal laws penalising assault and other forms of abuse may be used, they are rarely relied upon even by Pakistani citizens...

.... In this elaborate scheme of pimps and agents, the criminal involvement of law enforcement agents, motivated by corruption, serves to seal the fate of these women and children in an alien country. Occasionally token raids are made in which only the women and children are arrested and the real criminals of the trade, the pimps, go free. The arrested women and children are the ones usually harassed and victimised by the police. The participation of local police border control officials. Magistrates and other government officials in this illegal market increases the vulnerability of women economic migrants who cannot migrate legally (the laws allowing economic migration into Pakistan are generally inoperable for the poor) and have no protection from exploiting agents.

Once imprisoned, most women are either charged under the Foreigners Act prohibiting illegal entry and/or incorrectly charged under the zina section of the Hudood Ordinance, which specifically prohibits extra-marital sexual intercourse.

A majority of the trafficked women are further victimised by the police and pimps once in police custody. Once in jail, a large fraction of the trafficked women and children do not even have access to legal assistance, let alone the means to afford an attorney. Those who have the good fortune of obtaining competent free legal assistance and overcoming the additional hurdle of securing the surety and bail money (generally in the amount of Rs. 50,000 and above) are released. But they usually have nowhere to go in an alien country where there are many lying in wait to exploit them. As part of its free legal assistance, LHRLA directs its clients to private shelters, but neither the Bangladeshi nor the Pakistani governments are willing to help with their repatriation, legalisation of status or otherwise.

While the lawyers do not have access to their clients, the pimps, with the aid of jail authorities, manage to see them regularly, harassing and directing threats at them. Confined in deplorable jail conditions where they are frequently abused and with no access to any other source of help, the women submit to the pimps' offers to get them released. Under duress and in sheer desperation, the women agree to the conditions of the pimps. Once released, they are forced to comply with the conditions, since it appears to be their only hope in the face of involvement of the law enforcement authorities on the one hand and the pimps' threats to revoke the bail on the other. They are trapped. Furthermore, shame, fear and poverty force them to remain entrapped in the web of this trade, preventing them from returning to their country.

.... it is acknowledged in the Police Report that the police victimize the women and children by demanding "bhatta" (protection money) in the amount of Rs. 50 to Rs. 200 per week per person from the undocumented victims of trafficking. Without the bhatta, the victims are threatened with "...arrest for an indefinite period". The infrequent token arrest of agents is soon followed by their release on bail, but a conviction never occurs. If a raid is conducted on a den or brothel, the trafficked women and children are arrested, imprisoned and often incorrectly criminally charged for zina and/or illegal entry and forgery of documents.

The police, who are responsible for investigating the matter thoroughly before issuing charges, could question the trafficked victims as witnesses against the agents to help prosecute them under various provisions of the Hudood Ordinance, including (Sec.10) - "rape liable to tazir", and others that may be applicable. This, however, is never done. In rape cases....the police ... never... through their investigations, help the victims develop a case of rape liable to tazir, which has a lower evidentiary requirement in that it does not require four male eye witnesses. However, because some police officials are on the payroll of the agents, or because of other ill-intentions, fear or disinterest, they lack the will to enforce the law in the larger interest of justice. Instead, the police effectively indemnify the actual criminals in this trade.

In 1990, the then Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Afzal Zullah, initiated Public Interest Litigation for the courts to take cognizance suo moto, of human rights violations brought to their attention. However, the program is under-utilized by the judiciary.

sidebar 

Recommendations on Prevention and Suppression of Trafficking of Women and Children into Pakistan

1. The governments of sending, receiving and transit countries in conjunction with national, regional and international NGOs must wage a sincere and responsible campaign against agents involved in trafficking including border guards and other law enforcement authorities.
2. These governments must train and position law enforcement authorities to be ready to prosecute the trafficking agents under criminal and civil laws.
3. Trafficked women and children must be recognised as victims of trafficking and not as criminals.
4. The victims of trafficking must be considered witnesses to the crime of trafficking and not as criminals.
5. The rights of women and child victims must be protected and the criminal agents must be prosecuted under existing domestic and international laws prohibiting trafficking.
6. If and when victims testify against the agents, they must be afforded protection and their right to privacy must be upheld.
7. The repatriation costs of victims of trafficking who wish to return to their country of nationality must be shared by the sending and receiving countries.
8. The Government of Pakistan must provide temporary, if not permanent, amnesty to those victims unwilling to be repatriated, with the option of permanently legalising their status in Pakistan.
9. Trafficked women as migrant workers must be protected by relevant ILO conventions.
10. Governments and NGOs of sending, receiving and transit countries must institute an education campaign to minimise the social stigmatization of victims of trafficking.
11. NGOs of these countries must be prepared and well positioned to provide training, job placement and financial assistance to rehabilitate survivors of trafficking to prevent further exploitation and to facilitate their self determination.
12. The trafficking agents must be financially liable for all costs incurred in rehabilitating the victims of trafficking.
13. Governments of sending, receiving and transit countries must introduce a law specifically to protect the rights of trafficked women and children.
14. Governments of these countries must introduce specific laws protecting domestic servants.
15. Governments of sending, receiving and transit countries must fulfil their obligations under international instruments, and should work with domestic regional and international NGOs to effectively implement the provisions of these laws with the goal of curbing trafficking and protecting the human rights of victims of this crime.
16. NGOs of sending, receiving and transit countries must approach the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women with documented cases of trafficked women and children.

Pakistan is a signatory to the following international instruments for the prevention and suppressing of trafficking in human being, yet effective enforcement is seriously lacking resulting in the continuance of forced domestic labour and prostitution of women and children. Corrupt and insensitive officials continue to exploit the vulnerabilities of these victims.

Based in Karachi, Pakistan, Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid (LHRLA), is a non-profit, non-political organisation formed by a group of lawyers (50) in January 1989. LHRLA activities include: providing free legal services in cases related to child abuse, rape, torture, divorce, inheritance, illegal detention, child custody, constitutional petitions for fundamental rights and public interest litigation; documentation; conducting para-legal training courses and lobbying for reform against discriminatory laws.

Contact address: Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid

D-1, 1st floor, Court View Apartments

Opposite Sindh Assembly Building

Court Road, Karachi - 74200, (Pakistan)