Child marriage, trafficking on the rise amid Covid-19 pandemic: Report

At a time when the Covid-19 pandemic has forced the world indoors, child marriages, trafficking and labour seem to have risen in the country, a report suggested.

An investigation by Childline, the national helpline for children set up by the Ministry for Women and Child Development, said that 1.92 lakh on-ground interventions were recorded between March and August as compared to 1.70 lakh interventions during the same period last year, an Indian Express report said.

Within these six months, the child helpline received about 27 lakh distress calls. In contrast, the organisation got 36 lakh calls last year, alarming the officials as they had expected the numbers to dip sharply following the nationwide coronavirus-induced lockdown.

Over 10,000 cases of child marriage were tracked during the same time period of which most of were prevented, the report said.

The organisation actively intervened in at least 32,700 cases of trafficking, child marriage, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, begging and cybercrime.

Read: Over 1 crore children aged between 5 and 14 forced to work as coronavirus batters India

It also intervened in 6,800 cases related to child labour. The next few months would be crucial as the economy opens up and industries look for cheap labour with the exodus of migrant labourers from cities, an official of the Childline India Foundation told the publication.

The Union Home Ministry, on July 6, had appealed to the states and Union Territories to sensitise officers at all levels to combat the "serious and deplorable" crime of human trafficking.

“Children and youth are more likely to be persuaded or tricked by criminals who take advantage of their emotional instability and missing support system. Once trafficked, the victims fall prey to many forms of unfair treatment such as forced prostitution, forced labour, forced begging, forced marriages, etc,” it said in an advisory on preventing and combating human trafficking especially during the period of Covid-19 pandemic.

The ministry had also advised the states and Union Territories to "immediately" set up new Anti Human Trafficking Units (AHTUs), upgrade the infrastructure of the existing ones in all the districts and make them functional on "most urgent basis". This was supposed to be done with the financial assistance provided by the central government.