Focus on prevention of child trafficking, says Shashi Panja

Kolkata: Women and Child Development and Social Welfare minister Shashi Panja emphasised on prevention of child trafficking as International Child Rights Week concluded on Wednesday.

"We have to focus on the prevention of child trafficking," said Panja, on the sidelines of closing ceremony International Child Rights Week at Mohor Kunja.

According the National Crime Records Bureau report, Bengal recorded 4,168 cases of girl trafficking in 2012, the highest in the country.

The next five years saw this figure sliding to 299 in 2017.

The report also pointed out that during that period the number of Kanyashree applicants shot up from 19.3 lakh to 28.1 lakh.

Kanyashree, an initiative started by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in 2011, was aimed to incentivise school education among girls to prevent girl trafficking and child marriages. Kanyashree was launched to prevent child marriage in economically-weaker sections under an annual household income of Rs 1.2 lakh.'Kanyashree Prakalpa' is a targeted conditional cash transfer scheme aimed at retaining girls in schools and other educational and skill development institutions along with preventing child marriage.

The scheme has already enrolled more than four million adolescent girls with the state government transferring a sanctioned some of money directly to the beneficiaries' bank account.

While a separate AHTU (Anti Human Trafficking Unit), of which the nodal unit is CID, was also set up in 2014.

A campaign titled 'Operation Smile' and 'Operation Muskan' was held from 2015 to 2017. Many girls were rescued with help of the initiative.

Operation Smile, also known as Operation Muskan, was an initiative of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to rescue/rehabilitate missing children.

As part of the operation, several activities were taken up by the State Police personnel to trace and rescue the missing children and reunite them with their families.

A survey report on 'Exploratory Research: Dip stick Assessment on Impact of Domestic Violence on Children' conducted by West Bengal Commission for the Protection of Child Rights with support of UNICEF was released at the closing ceremony International Child Rights Week at Mohor Kunja.

This apart, a booklet on Cyber Safety (in English and Bengali) for children was also released. Bravery Awards (Birangana and Birpurush) were given to 25 children for child rights. Shishusree Awards were given to journalists for best reporting on Child Rights.

Awards were also presented to Child Friendly police and Child friendly Child Care Institutions.

On Tuesday, a fast track court in Haldia sentenced 10 convicts for their involvement in a human-trafficking racket. The punishment ranged from three years to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment. The order was passed by Judge Anil Kumar Prasad. The two ring leaders of the racket, a brothel owner and its manager, were sentenced to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment, while five brothel employees were sentenced to seven years each.

For the first time in Bengal, customers were held guilty for having sexual intercourse with minors and were sentenced to three years of imprisonment, said Dilip Shee, Public Prosecutor, fast track court, Haldia.