Dubai-Child Slavery-Food for thought!

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From: Jessica Tuteur/Charmaine Driscoll 
Email: jessicat@napanet.net

RE: Dubai, Child Slavery, Should we participate?

As a footnote to the Dubai-WEC debate, take a look at these articles. 

Child slavery in Dubai, UAE is prevalent. Small children (as young as 3 yo) are sold into slavery to be used in camel races as jockeys. Once they are done being used as jockeys they are discarded, living as street children or killed.

Should we be supporting a country, participating in events sponsored by a country, etc. that is known for its CHILD ABUSE practices.

Just food for thought. Think about it.

Jessica Tuteur
Charmaine Driscoll

Articles:

Frontline 

India's National Magazine
From the publishers of THE HINDU 

Vol. 14 :: No. 20 :: Oct. 4 - 17, 1997 

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Trafficking in children 

The detention of groups of children from Bangladesh in Bangalore and Chennai has led to investigations into a criminal network involved in sending small children to the Gulf, many to be used in camel races. 

ASHA KRISHNAKUMAR
in Chennai 

CAMEL racing is a popular sport in the desert states of West Asia. In some places, however, the sport takes a cruel form: in place of trained camel riders, young boys are used. The boys, often between three and eight years and light in weight, are strapped to the camels; the animals are then whipped to set them running, and the terrified cries of the children spur the animals on. The child-jockeys are brought, often illegally, from impoverished countries by unscrupulous agents. 

In September, 54 Bangladeshi children who were to be flown out to the United Arab Emirates, apparently to serve as jockeys in camel racing, were rescued: 16 in Bangalore on September 12 (see box) and 38 near Chennai on September 15. The children were accompanied by 50 adults, who had each reportedly paid agents up to 60,000 Bangladesh takas for a job in Dubai; they were apparently given a 50 per cent discount on the fee for taking the children along as their wards. 

Eleven 'couples' with 23 children; five single women with 11 children; three single men with three children; two single men; and one child without an accompanying adult formed the contingent rescued from Thameen Ansari dargah at Kovalam, near Mamallapuram, about 60 km from Chennai. Barring a few who were accompanied by their own children, the others were given charge of the children by agents in Bangladesh or in India. All 32 adults are illiterate; they are agricultural workers or have done odd jobs for living. Except Mujibur, who owned a grocery store and also worked part-time with a travel company, the rest earned less than 1,500 takas a month. 

S. MAHINSHA

Some of the Bangladeshi women and children rescued from Thameen Ansari dargah at Kovalam, near Chennai, at the Kelambakkam police station on September 17. 

A first information report (FIR) filed by the Kelambakkam police station, under which the dargah comes, described the persons rescued from Kovalam as victims and named Abdul Mannan, a suspected agent, as an accused. Abdul Mannan was arrested on September 17 from I.S. Lodge in Chennai, where the victims had earlier been housed. According to Deputy Inspector-General of Police Nanjil Kumaran, Abdul Mannan has been charged under Sections 120(B) (conspiracy) and 363 (kidnapping) of the Indian Penal Code, and Section 10 of the Foreigners Act and remanded to judicial custody. Kancheepuram Magistrate M. Vijayalakshmi placed the rescued in the custody of Udavum Karangal, an organisation which provides shelter to orphans and destitutes. 

According to Inspector S. Thiagarajan, who is investigating the case, the only offence of those rescued was that they were travelling without valid documents. According to him, only 19 had passports (three were subsequently recovered from Abdul Mannan). According to those rescued, the passports of the others were with Bablu and Shiraz, two agents arrested in Bangalore. (Asked what action would be taken against those who were travelling without valid documents, Chief Immigration Officer in Chennai Aziz Bangra said he had "no comments to make".) 

Nanjil Kumaran does not foresee any problem in repatriating those rescued, though it could take some time because repatriation involves two governments. According to him, the Tamil Nadu Government has informed the Union Government, which, in turn, has informed the Bangladesh High Commission in New Delhi. 

The case indicates the existence of an organised racket exporting 'families' and children from Bangladesh to Dubai. Each of the 104 persons (70 detained in Chennai and 34 in Bangalore) came from different villages and had a local agent. According to the persons rescued, they left their villages separately and crossed the border and entered Siliguri, Malda or Calcutta after changing several buses. Then with or without the 'made-up' families they reached Chennai from Calcutta after changing trains about five times. No one knew the places they passed through, but at every stop they were met by an agent - some not even known to them - who put them in another train or accompanied them for a part of the journey. 

One of the persons rescued said, "For taking along the children, our agents gave us a 50 per cent concession on the travel and visa fee." But some women, like Parabin, Komalla and Khurshida Banu, were not told that they had to travel as a made-up family until they reached Siliguri, Malda or Calcutta. Some, like Halima, were told about their 'family' only in Chennai. A family, they were told, was essential to get the visa to Dubai. 

While most paid 60,000 takas to the agents, some who could not pay up in full were asked to pay 30,000 takas in advance, the rest payable in Dubai. To raise these sums, most of them sold what little they had. They had heard from friends and others who had come back from the Gulf that a person can earn 8,000-10,000 takas a month or that their children would be well taken care of, even if they were to ride camels. 

Once in Chennai, they were put up at I.S. Lodge at Periamet, a business centre in the heart of the city. According to Mujibur, who reached the lodge on September 7 along with his 10-year-old brother Sagar (who had apparently come to see Mujibur off at Dhaka but was persuaded to join him by the agent, Feroze), every floor of the lodge was virtually a "Bangladeshi basti" (settlement). This, Mujibur told Frontline, made him nervous, as he had not been told that he would be travelling with such a big group. He had been under the impression that he was to be sent by himself to Dubai. Seeing four floors of Bangladeshis, some of whom had been there for six months, made him suspect that something was wrong. His suspicion intensified when he found that they were being locked in. 

He conveyed his fears to the others on September 10 and tried to mobilise them saying, "We have given money to go to Dubai, but things are suspicious here. Let us get the protection of the law. Let us go out and try to get help". Some agreed. But, according to Mujibur, Abdul Mannan asked him to keep quiet. 

On September 11, Bablu and Shiraz, said to be the key agents, told the group that the first batch of 34 (16 children and 18 adults) would be taken to Dubai via Bangalore. The others, they said, would have to wait with Abdul Mannan for their travel documents and tickets. On September 12, the 34 were detained at Bangalore airport while trying to board a flight to Sharjah, and Shiraz and Bablu were arrested. On hearing the news of the arrests, Abdul Mannan sent the remaining 70 persons to the dargah at Kovalam on September 14. If questioned, he told them, they were to say that they had come from West Bengal to visit the 700-year-old dargah. 

The group did not arouse any suspicion at Kovalam because groups making a pilgrimage to the dargah was not uncommon. 

The next day Abdul Mannan came to the dargah with a couple of chulhas, some rice and vegetables and left immediately. The group spent the next day also at the dargah. That evening, one of them went out of the dargah and tried to speak to some students of a local school. Suspecting him to be a child-lifter, some local people beat him up. And, as news of the group spread, a mob reached the dargah and beat up the Bangladeshi men. They were handed over to the police which started questioning them, with help from Bangladeshi students of an engineering college nearby. As they were of a different nationality, and since there were women and children, the police, on instructions from Nanjil Kumaran, lodged them all at Balaji Ladies Hostel in Kelambakkam. Local people provided them with food and clothing. 

During questioning, there were frequent references to Abdul Mannan. The police saw him to be a key person in the matter and picked him up from I.S. Lodge. Some of the Bangladeshis this correspondent met thought that Abdul Mannan was also a victim; he had told them that he paid 30,000 takas to an agent. According to Komalla, Abdul Mannan was the most articulate among them and acted as their spokesman. The rescued Bangladeshis spoke well of the Chennai police, who declared them victims and placed them all in the custody of Udavum Karangal. 

At Udavum Karangal, the victims seemed to be comfortable, but were still afraid of being jailed. Many of them cried. One of them, Hussain, said, "We do not want to go to Dubai - please send us home." Some others seemed to be ashamed to go back because, as Komalla said, "not only were we cheated but we also had to pretend to be someone else's wife or husband." 

Did they know about camel racing? Some did. Khurshida Banu, for instance, had been told by her agent in her village that children taken for the sport would be looked after well and be provided with good food and good clothes; and when they reached a certain height, they would be taught how to ride camels. Their impression was that once the children learnt to ride well, they could earn crores of takas. 

The plight of the children is heart-rending. They seem to be still in shock with people asking them questions they hardly understand; they answered the questions in whispers. Most did not even know where they were from. After a lot of coaxing, one of them said, with tears rolling down his cheeks, "I want to go back to ma." 

Aabir, 7, said he was from Sherpur, but he did not know where he was going. His father had come to see him off at Dhaka. Abul, the man who brought him here, had promised him chocolates. Aabir is now very scared as Abul is not to be seen. He held my hand and whispered to me: "Please write to my parents to take me home." 


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Frontline | The Hindu Full Text | The Hindu News Briefs | Business Line 

India's National Magazine
From the publishers of THE HINDU 

Vol. 14 :: No. 20 :: Oct. 4 - 17, 1997 

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An organised racket 

RAVI SHARMA 

THAT children from the Indian subcontinent are used as jockeys in camel races in some parts of the Gulf has been known for some time. But the detention of 34 Bangladeshis, including 16 young boys, at Bangalore's Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) Airport on September 12 indicates a new dimension to the problem - Bangalore may have become a gateway out of India for agents transporting Bangladeshi children to Gulf countries. 

With Bangladesh tightening its emigration laws, making it difficult for agents to smuggle out children for camel racing and other purposes, recruiting agents began to bring the children into India and, often using false papers, flew them out of Calcutta or Mumbai to the Gulf. Once Indian immigration authorities at Calcutta and Mumbai airports became aware of this modus operandi, the going became difficult for the agents, who were forced to look for alternative exit routes. Bangalore airport seemed safe. It does not have a full-fledged international airport and its airport does not have permanently staffed immigration officials (local police officers are posted on temporary duty). 

Assistant Commissioner of Police R. Subramani, who was manning the immigration post at the HAL airport, detained the group of Bangladeshis after he became suspicious, since all the children were boys and about the same age. Further, the age of some of the boys was declared in passports as 10 or 11, but none appeared to be above five years old. 

Subramani said, "Some of the children even looked drugged and, when questioned, neither the parents nor the children were able to provide authentic answers. Although the names of the children had been included in the adults' passports, there was no official seal or signature. One person was not even able to tell me the child's name endorsed on his passport. Even the Indian visas lacked the official seal." Had the Bangladeshis not come in a group, said Subramani, it would have been difficult to discern if they were genuine visitors or part of an organised group. 

In contrast to the case in Chennai, where the group of Bangladeshis detained are being considered victims of the agents, the adult members of the group detained in Bangalore were arrested under Sections 3 and 14 of the Foreigners Act (overstaying without valid documents) read with Sections 109 (abetting crime) and 471 (using a forged document as genuine) of the Indian Penal Code and taken into judicial custody. The children have been interned, along with the five Bangladeshi women prisoners, in Bangalore Central Jail. 

Investigations by the Bangalore police indicated that the majority of those arrested were from villages in and around Dhaka and had been lured by the rags-to-riches stories of fellow Bangladeshis who had gone to the Gulf. Some of the persons arrested claimed that they were going to visit relatives in Dubai and Sharjah. Some others admitted that the boys were being taken to Sharjah to serve as camel jockeys. They said the money was good, up to 5,000 UAE dirhams (Rs.50,000) a month during the camel racing season. The parents were also promised jobs as gardeners and stable-hands. 

K. GOPINATHAN
<Picture>The Bangladeshi children and women who were detained at the HAL airport in Bangalore on September 12. 

One of the persons arrested Abdul Malek Patwari, said that his two sons were among the 16 children interned. He said, "I want my two children to take part in camel races. It earns me good money. Since it has become difficult to go from my country, I came to India." Others, however, denied any involvement in camel racing and said they had no idea about it. Alaya Begum, also arrested, said, "We took a train to Bangalore only because we wanted to save money. We are going to work legally. We only followed the advice given by our agent, who is known to our relatives, and came here." Some others said they were on a pilgrimage to Ajmer. 

While the women claimed after their arrest that the children were their own, social workers who met the children have a different tale to tell. Aiyesha, a social worker with Janodaya, a public trust that does work with women prisoners, said, "When I first met the children, they were very disturbed, afraid and did not speak. The women had beaten them and told them not to speak to us, or even eat. But after a couple of days, the children, out of sheer hunger, began to eat and later talked to us. The children could have been kidnapped. The children are familiar with the women, having been with them for long, and have been trained to say that they are their mothers. But it comes out quite clearly that the women are not their mothers. After first saying that the women were their mothers, some of the children are now saying 'this is not my mother'." 

A nun who met the children said that she did not believe that the boys were the children of the women. "Only one, at the most two, of the boys had their real mothers with them. The women had instructed the boys not to talk to us." 

Some of the boys told Aiyesha that their fathers had come along with them and would take them back home. 

According to Inspector H.T. Ramesh, one of the officers investigating the case, the group came to India in August and travelled by train to Chennai after visiting Delhi and Ajmer. From Chennai, they took a train to Bangalore on the day of their scheduled departure to Sharjah. 

Agents in Chennai used the time when the group was in India to organise their travel papers. Though prepaid tickets had been issued from Sharjah, visas had not been obtained. According to the police, one of the agents, identified as Syed, had flown to Sharjah to receive the group. Two other agents who accompanied the group to Bangalore were absconding; another, Mohammed Tahir, was picked up along with the group. 

Ramesh alleged that the operation was part of a network organised by agents who were operating in India, Bangladesh and the Gulf. 


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