39 Nepali girls rescued from hotel in Paharganj
Police says girls staying on own volition.
New Delhi: Continuing to put a bridle on human traffickers in the national capital, the Delhi Commission for Women, in a joint op-eration with the police, rescued 39 Nepalese girls from a hotel in Paharganj in the early hours on Wednesday.
However, the DCP M.S. Randhawa said that the rescued girls were “staying in the hotel on their own volition and had come to Delhi in search of employment.”
“They have not indicated any cognizable offence committed against them,” he tweeted.
According to the DCW, the anti-trafficking operation started at 1 am following a tip-off and continued till 6 am.
DCW chief Swati Mali-wal took to Twitter to provide details about the operation. “DCW receiv-ed tip off and rescued 39 Nepali girls from Hotel Hriday Inn, Paharganj. Raid lasted the entire night and assistance was provided by Delhi Police. Entire hotel had only trafficked Nepali girls who were being sent to Gulf countries. Huge trafficking racket busted!” she tweeted.
The victims are in the age group of 18 to 30 years and had been trafficked from earthquake-affected regions of Nepal on the pretext of providing jobs. The hotel housed only Nepali girls and no money was taken from them. Their “agents” used to pay the hotel. The girls were being sent to Gulf countries and Sri Lanka.
An information was received from a woman that her sister had already been sent by the traffickers to Sri Lanka and she has not been able to contact her ever since. She added that she had been pleading the trafficker to return her sister’s passport and allow her to leave for Nepal, but to no avail. Most of the girls shared similar harrowing stories, said the DCW.
This was DCW’s third rescue operation within a week. DCW Chief Swati Maliwal said, “Poorest of poor women and girls of Nepal are being exploited. Delhi is slowly becoming ‘Trafficking Capital’ of the world. When will Home minister of the country Rajnath Singh ji will take cognizance? I appeal to Rajnath Singh ji to call an emergency meeting with LG and DCW over human trafficking rackets running in Delhi.”
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