2019: A 14-year-old who quit studies midway in Class X to work in a gold factory in Chennai, and escape poverty, is rescued.
2023: The rescued teenager, now 18, is a first-year undergraduate student, having used a part of the money he received as compensation to rebuild his life and get back to studies. He has used a scholarship from his college to enrol in a computer course.
The life of the teenager and its many twists and turns embody the importance of vigil against trafficking and the need to rehabilitate survivors at the earliest.
Scarcity at home led him to being lured to Chennai, convinced by a distant relative that a job in a gold factory there would “take him out of poverty”.
The boy’s father works in a plastic factory in Kolkata and his mother works part-time as a labourer in Hooghly where they live. “We didn’t have enough money at home. We also don’t have any land where we could do farming. So I thought that in Chennai I would be able to earn money and improve our conditions,” he said.
The teenager, now 18, said in the two months that he was there he was given food and lodging but “no money”.
“We could go out but only with seniors and there was no independence,” he recalled.
His mother has only studied up to Class VIII and his father up to Class V.
“The rescue of 50 minor boys was carried out by the government of Tamil Nadu in September 2019. Thereafter... they were escorted by police and labour officials to Kolkata and handed over to officials in Bengal. These boys then were sent to government shelter homes from where they were handed back to their families. International Justice Mission (IJM) officials were directed by the state labour office and child welfare committee to follow up on these cases,” said Sisir Thanikal, state advocacy, IJM.
Officials of IJM, who work in the field of bonded labour, said many of the boys do not realise until much later that they are being exploited.
“They are given proper lodging facilities and good food by the employer. When they are rescued, some of them feel they are being robbed of an opportunity to earn a living,” said an IJM official.
This teenager who now goes to college got compensation, which helped him put his life back on track.
“When I came back, it was a few days before my exam in school. I wrote the test and passed Madhyamik and the higher secondary exams. I have used some of the (compensation) money and the rest is still in the bank,” he said.
“I live in a house with a tin roof that leaks. I could not bring back money home but, hopefully, education would help me rebuild my house,” he said.
Ananya Chatterjee Chakraborti, advisor to the state commission for protection of child rights, said: “Most of such boys are first-generation learners who do not understand the value of education. Our efforts are to educate this generation.”