Trafficking in women and children is the fastest growing criminal enterprise in the world. World-wide, more than one million children are reportedly trafficked and sold for sexual purposes. It is estimated that more than one million girls and women are currently trapped in brothels in India. Out of these, about one-fourth are Nepalese girls. Every year thousands of girls form villages in Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan and other South Asian countries are trafficked into India to work as sex slaves.
Regional Anti-Trafficking Initiative: UNIFEM has initiated a regional intervention on preventing trafficking in women and children in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka
In partnership with governments of the region, UN agencies, including ILO and UNICEF, USAID, the US State Department, NGOs, and professionals, UNIFEM is addressing causes, issues, and problems underlying trafficking in the South Asia region. Through advocacy, governments have been involved in documenting the present state of trafficking through the conduction and publication of national studies in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Pakistan. This achieved two things: (I) validation of available data and (2) a move from the denial phase to one of acknowledgment.
UNIFEM’s anti-trafficking programme in South Asia has regional and national components, and seeks to reduce incidences of trafficking of women and children through regional collaboration with diverse partners, which include, the Police, the justice delivery system, NGOs, CBOs, medical practitioners and the media. The programme focuses on:
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Enhancing the data and information system to address gaps of reliable information on the different aspects of trafficking
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Policy advocacy including support to policy planning processes within government agencies, NGO’s and civil society
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Strengthening regional and national networks and coalitions which function as lobby groups working towards advocacy on issues related to trafficking
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Developing capacity of groups working in prevention, rescue, rehabilitation and prosecution and showcasing best practices in these different areas
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Media and awareness generation with a view to create awareness about the issue of trafficking at the grassroots level as well as at multiple levels of Governance.
Through its processes, the initiative has led to the formation of a South Asia Forum against Human Trafficking (SAFAHT). This facilitates and supports activities of national, regional and local networks, including exchange of information and experiences. A South Asia Professionals against Trafficking (SAPAT), has also been set up, comprising of committed police personnel, prosecutors/lawyers, judges/magistrates, doctors, and media persons, as a non-formal pressure group of professionals against trafficking. UNIFEM also has a Regional Resource Center, which has a wide collection of information resources on the issue of trafficking. A web site also has been set up which covers the issue of trafficking very comprehensively and provides useful links to other important sites. The site address is www.unifemantitrafficking.org
Anti-trafficking of Women and Children:
Bolstering Law Enforcement and Legal Efforts to tackle the issue of trafficking, UNIFEM supported a Mumbai-based NGO (Prerana) to create an Anti-Trafficking Centre in the heart of Mumbai‘s red-light district. The centre is open for use by all Mumbai anti-trafficking NGO’s as well as police and state employees interested in learning about or taking action against sex trafficking. The Centre focuses on 1) training 2) NGO networking and 3) data collection and analysis.
Undertaking pilot projects to test innovative approaches to women’s empowerment and gender mainstreaming.
To make legal and judicial systems more responsive to the concerns of women affected by violence, in 1997, UNIFEM in partnership with UNICEF ROSA formed a regional network of women and two men advocates (activists) drawn from Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka Pakistan and India. It undertook to make in-depth country studies of existing laws in their respective countries, to analyze them to identify lacunae with a view to reforming discriminatory laws against women. Focusing on different priority areas in each country: Bangladesh on violence against women, India on dowry and VAW, Nepal on Property Law and VAW, Pakistan on rape and VAW and Sri Lanka on sexual abuse. The India Study, “Law, Violence and Women in India” by Kirti Singh has been published.
The initiative began in 1997, and is a follow-up to the recommendations that emerged during the Ninth Plan preparation process with women’s groups and the women’s movement, in the presence of DWCD, GOI and the Planning Commission. It is a regional effort to work with the judiciary to look at ways of making the justice delivery system more gender sensitive in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, with particular emphasis on cases pertaining to VAW, in partnership with SAKSHI. It involves developing, refining and adapting education modules for the judiciary in these countries involving Judges of the apex courts of the South Asia region as well as activists and members of Law faculty.
The two pronged strategy focuses on training judiciary personnel including judges and advocating for changes in procedures. Each year Protocol meetings of Superior court judges are held within each of the South Asian countries, as well as in-country and national workshops. The process of equality education for judges is being carried deeper, extending not only to the judiciary of the apex courts but also to representatives of the judiciary at the lower and state levels. The NGO-Judge partnership is being strengthened. Interventions are being deepened in different states of India and countries of the region, creating training modules, strengthening national networks and formalizing the Asia Pacific Advisory Forum on Equality Education for Judges. Country specific training modules are being developed and a core group of Resource Persons is being created. Linkages are being made with other mainstream institutions, such as the police and medical practitioners in India and Nepal. There is ongoing audiovisual and other documentation. In Nepal, a “Judges Society”, an informal forum, has been set up to train judges on equality issues.
Reinventing India – Action for Empowerment and Elimination of Violence against women
With donors and NGO partners, efforts are being undertaken to eliminate violence against women by empowering women with information on services and their rights available to them, and raising awareness of men on their possible role in preventing gender-based violence.
1. Access to Information: The content and methodology for the Resource Directory on Violence against Women was finalized in consultation with NGOs from the states of Kerala, Karnataka, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Bihar and Orissa and researchers from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences. It was decided that the Directory would have the following content and categories: Shelter, Counseling, Legal Aid, Health (Government Hospitals: Emergency Services, Psychiatric and Burns Units, Gynaecology, etc), police (women’s Cells) and Skill Training (as a second level support service). The Institute for Development Studies, Jaipur (IDSJ) in Rajasthan, National Institute of Advanced Studies in (Karnataka), SAKHI Women’s Resource Centre (Kerala), SANHITA (West Bengal) & Institute of Socio-economic Development (Orissa) are preparing the Directories in English and the local language of the state.
The Resource Directories, ‘Support Services to Counter Violence against Women’ from the states of Orissa, Karnataka, Kerala and Rajasthan have been published.
2. Exploring alliances with men to eliminate VAW: UNIFEM is working with Zonta International and NGOS, to eliminate violence against women. One of the creative ways in which it is doing so, is by partnering men and men’s organizations in India to raise awareness of men on their possible role in preventing gender-based violence. Through its support to the Department of Sociology, University of Delhi, to undertake research on “From violence to supportive practices: Family, gender and masculinities in India,” efforts are being made to identify positive male models who have or are making a difference in questioning the stereotypical notions of masculinity. Through a “travelling seminar” on gender, masculinity and VAW with the NGO AAKAR, young men and women in six universities of India are being reached out to. Three multidisciplinary travelling seminars “exploring masculinities” within the university system, have been organized in collaboration with the University of Pune, University of Trivandrum and the University of Delhi. They seek to further explore issues of sexuality and masculinity, which have been brought to the fore because of increased VAW, the rapid increase of HIV/AIDS and the population control policies.
3. Legal Literacy: UNIFEM is supporting Multiple Action Research Group (MARG) to carry out legal literacy workshops using available material and creating new material. The legal literacy effort focuses on some areas most prone to gender based violence. Community-specific versions of materials and posters are being developed. Three posters on Rape and Dowry have been printed in Hindi, with the English versions to follow suit soon. Through partners, awareness is being raised and capacity built of NGOs as well as grassroots women on legal literacy issues in Ranchi, Giridih in (JHARKHAND) and Bikaner and Udaipur in (RAJASTHAN).