New Delhi: In a three-hour-long operation, a joint team of police, labour department officials and activists from an NGO led by a sub-divisional magistrate, on Tuesday rescued 45 children aged between 11 and 17 from six diary and file-making and refrigerator packing material units from Ghodewali Gali, which falls under the jurisdiction of Deshbandhu Gupta police station of Karol Bagh.
According to press statement shared by the NGO, most of the children were trafficked from Madhubani district of Bihar. In fact, seven of these children hail from the same village, Mehthar Patti, in Madhubani district. Also, some of the children were trafficked from Darbhanga and Motihari, though they numbered fewer than those from Madhubani. The operation was led by Karol Bagh SDM Ankur Meshram.
This is the second time in slightly over a month that as many as 45 children were rescued in a single rescue sweep in Delhi. On October 15, the same number of children were rescued from plastic toy and steel polishing units in the Wazirpur Industrial Area in Northwest Delhi. According to rescuers, the children were forced to work long hours with some of them labouring for up to 15 hours or more every day.
"A few others worked grueling 14-hour-long schedules between 8am and 10pm.
They worked out of small, dingy and ill-lit rooms in Ghodewali Gali and broke once for lunch which was usually around 2 pm or 3 pm", added one of the rescuers.
Most of the children were not paid in time and some
were paid a paltry sum of Rs 2,000 each, that too once in eight months. Others were handed out a one-time sum of Rs 5,000 over a period of several months. An 11-year-old child was being paid Rs 100 a week. These children produced 1,500 diaries in the course of one full day's work. While officials here sealed the six premises from where the children were rescued, a couple of owners were detained by the police and FIRs were lodged against them under the appropriate sections of the IPC.