Dhaka,   Thursday 28 March 2024

The South Asian Times | সাউথ এশিয়ান টাইমস

Violence of traffickers in the net world: Trafficking of women and children from Bangladesh

Published: 00:00, 26 December 2021

Violence of traffickers in the net world:  Trafficking of women and children from Bangladesh


Yasmin Reema
Horrible networks of women traffickers are spread across the country. They are collecting
women for trafficking using various technology apps including Ticktack, Like, Face book, Emo,
Viber, Discod, What Sapp. Despite employing their own brokers, women are being trafficked to
various countries including India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Dubai, Qatar and Oman of the United
Arab Emirates. Law enforcement officials say there are 30 or more such cycles across the
country. Again, some groups of human traffickers are trafficking women to different countries of
the Middle East by showing greed for the job of housemaid. Neither the police nor any non-
government organization has accurate statistics on the number of women trafficked from
Bangladesh each year.
According to the reports of various organizations, 2 lakh men, women and children have been
trafficked from Bangladesh in the last 10 years. Every year, 20,000 women, adolescents and
children are being trafficked from India, Pakistan and other countries in the Middle East.
According to another estimate, 50,000 women have been trafficked to India or other countries
through India in a few years. According to media reports, 500 women between the ages of 18
and 22 have been trafficked from Bangladesh in five years and 1,000 in eight years due to
misuse of information technology. Of the 312 human trafficking cases tried in the country in
2020, 256 were related to trafficking in women and sexual violence. In addition, in the last four
years, 260,000 women from Bangladesh have gone to Saudi Arabia as domestic workers. A
large part of them have been subjected to various forms of torture including sexual harassment.According to law enforcement agencies, the horrific network of women trafficking syndicates is
spread across the country.
In some cases they recruit women for trafficking through their own agents or brokers. Recently,
the use of information technology as a new addition to their activities has increased.
Acknowledging the matter, Khandaker Al Moin, commander of RAB`s legal and media wing,
said that 25 to 30 different syndicates or gangs are involved in trafficking in women across the
country. In these cycles there are male members as well as female members. We have already
arrested 7-8 chakras and brought them under the law. These gangs smuggle women out of the
country in different ways. The contact of one cycle with another cycle is in some cases and not
in many cases. The process of arresting members of the trafficking ring is a continuous process.
"We have arrested several members of the gang after a video of a Bangladeshi girl being
brutally tortured in Bangalore, India by Tiktak Hridoy and her forces went viral on social media,"
he said. We have even arrested women members of the gang. Recently, a new dimension has
come in the trafficking of women.
That is the members of the trafficking ring formed different groups on different apps including
Facebook, Messenger, TickTock, Like. There, they are lured abroad in various ways, including
doing tick-tack shows, doing like shows, having pool parties, and luring teenagers to a better
life. After taking women abroad and making them addicted to drugs, they tortured them and
forced them to commit immoral acts. Later sold in various sex polies. In some cases, women
are trafficked to neighboring countries with various types of baits through brokers. The RAB
official said, "We have talked about shutting down some harmful apps, including Tic Tac Toe."
The High Court has already banned some games. We don`t have to try alone. For this, the
parents also need awareness and the representatives in the society who are listened to by the
people should also be vocal. This will reduce such immoral crimes in the society. According to
the investigation, a large number of women and children are constantly missing in different
districts of the country. From January to June, 413 women went missing from Chandpur district.
This information was obtained by analyzing six months GD and cases in eight police stations of
the district. Of these, 394 have been rescued. 19 people could not be rescued. It is believed that
some of them have been trafficked. A police inspector, speaking on condition of anonymity, said
most of the women and teenagers had left their homes due to misuse of information technology,
including Facebook. At the same time, cases of abduction of 21 women and children were
registered in five police stations of Chuadanga district. Victims of five cases could not be
rescued. Dhaka Metropolitan Police Deputy Commissioner of Tejgaon. Shahidullah said that
women are being trafficked by using information technology including TickTock, Laiki and
Facebook.
We are a little late to understand the matter. We thought, these apps are just for fun and they
are running worldwide. But later I saw that a group of young people are getting involved in
horrible crimes by organizing through these apps. A 15-year-old girl named Toha Akhter Bithi
was recently trafficked to India from Hatirjheel police station area of the capital. Begunbari
resident said the girl`s father. Mona filed a case with Hatirjheel police station on July 8 hoping toget her back. Bithi`s mother said, `My daughter used to go for walks in Hatirjheel area from time
to time. A girl named Israt used to come there. They used to make tick video together. My
daughter was also asked to make a tick. Israt identifies his home as Jinjira. Israt got close to my
daughter and promised to work in a beauty parlor. A few days ago, a video of a woman who
went to Saudi Arabia as a housemaid was brutally harassed through social media. The woman
was later rescued and brought back to the country. He is a victim of oppressionThe woman`s
name is Sumi Akhter. He is a resident of Boda upazila of Panchagarh. A broker took her to work
as a housemaid in a house in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. After working in the house for four months,
the Saudi family sold it to another family in the border town of Najran, Oman, for 12,000 riyals
through his Kapil. The male members of that family used to torture Sumi terribly. After a video
uploaded by Sumi spread on social media, he was rescued and brought to Bangladesh. From
January to June, there were 72 cases of abduction and disappearance in Gaibandha. A total of
246 cases of missing women and children have been registered in five police stations of
Gazipur district. In addition, there have been two cases of human trafficking.
A total of 42 cases have been filed in three police stations in Meherpur for abducting women
and children. At the same time, 484 women and children were reported missing in Mymensingh
district. Among them, RAB revealed the information of trafficking his wife and sister-in-law to
India in exchange for marriage and a large sum of money after falling in love with a young
woman on the basis of his identity on Facebook. After the arrest of Yusuf Mia and his
associates on this charge, the commander of RAB-14 Lt. Colonel Abu Naeem said. Talat said,
`This gang of human traffickers has been trafficking women to India for a long time for 35 to 40
thousand rupees. District Superintendent of Police Ahmar Uzzaman said there were 92 cases of
missing women and children this year. There have been 464 general diaries. 433 people have
returned among the missing. So far 41 people have not been found. Of the 13 police stations in
the district, seven have filed cases under the Pornography Control Act. In the six months from
January to June, there were 74 abduction cases and 74 missing DGs in Netrokona. According
to the district police, most of the incidents were related to love escapes on mobile phones or
Facebook. Khandaker Farzana Rahman, Chairman, Department of Criminology, Dhaka
University, said that trafficking in women through the misuse of information technology is on the
rise at an alarming rate. As our dependence on technology increases in our daily lives; the risk
of such crimes will increase. The big reason for this is that teenagers or young women are
shown the dream of earning money from these apps. They become victims by being added to
different groups, chatting or being tempted by others. It is important to supervise these apps to
prevent such crimes. Moreover, it is necessary to see who is uploading what kind of content in
the app. Our border guards should increase border surveillance. So that no woman can easily
cross the border and go to another country.
Yasmin Reema is a Columnist and Journalist. She can be reached at
yasminreema@gmail.com‎

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