Human trafficking creates crisis as law lies like a lame duck

Arafat Ara
Most of the cases under the human trafficking-prevention law in the country have remained long pending for absence of a separate tribunal, sources concerned said.
Around 1,606 charges were filed between 2012 and April 2015 against human traffickers under the Human Trafficking Deterrence and Suppression Act 2012.
But a very insignificant number of the cases were settled, according to information available with the Human Trafficking Monitoring Cell.
Migrant rights activists and victims said if there had been any exemplary punishment meted out to a criminal, the situation would not get such alarming.
They alleged sometimes police delay in receiving cases and submitting charge sheets, which is another reason why the law could not be enforced.
Besides, due to absence of victim-protection system and rules a better enforcement of the law was not possible.
A total of 345 cases were filed in 2012 while 377 in 2013, some 682 in 2014 and 202 between January and April last, as per the cell at the police headquarters.
Although there is a provision for forming a separate tribunal for trying the trafficking cases, the authorities are using the existing tribunal under the Women and Children Repression Prevention Act 2002.

This court is already burdened with an extra load of a backlog of cases remaining pending for long.
As per the information of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, around 1,342 Bangladeshis were arrested over the last few days in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand on way of unauthorized migration.
Another horde of some 4,000 voyagers were still adrift at sea, the organizations said.
Maximum charges were filed under seventh, eighth and ninth sections of the law. Maximum punishment is mentioned under clause seventh, which is death sentence for organised trafficking.
The cases were filed mostly from Satkhira, Benapole, Cox's Bazaar and Teknaf, said police officials close to the monitoring cell.
They also agreed with some allegations, saying that some "mismatches are there in the process".
Sometimes the plaintiff withdraws case on threat from offenders.
Al Amin Nayan lodged the first case under the 2012 act on behalf of two captive workers. The plaintiff says he is now "hopeless" over getting judgment as it has taken a long time.
Mr Nayan, a member of the Anirban Survivor Voice, a voluntary group of victim migrants, said although the law is non-bailable and cognizable, criminals got bail after some days.
"None of 18 cases filed by me was settled so far," he says, as many quarters are now vocal about the humanitarian crisis that has now cropped up for years of negligence on this score.
Some 22 trafficked victims who returned from Iraq filed cases in 2014 against four recruiting agencies: Morning Sun Enterprise, East Bengal Overseas, Idea International, and Meghna Trade International.
Now the recruiters are allegedly threatening to entangle them in harassment cases in their bid to force the complainants to withdraw their complaints, said one of the victims, Ilias.
SHISUK (Shikha Shastha Unnayan Karzakram) executive director Sakiul Millat Morshed said for lack of necessary tribunal and victim-protection system, the law cannot take its own course.
Cases are not moving as lots of those piled up day by day.
He also said victims don't want to follow up on many occasions for getting threat from the offenders.
"We do not get witnesses for the same reason."
Besides, according to the act, cases are supposed to be settled within 190 days in court, but even after two to three years, those cases are not getting final judgment, Mr Morshed lamented.
He also emphasized the need for making rules under the act for its better implementation.    
Salma Ali, executive director of Bangladesh National Women Lawyers' Association (BNWLA), said labour trafficking from Bangladesh in the name of manpower export has been going on unabated but the government did not take it seriously.
"In absence of victim supports and for other loopholes people are not getting expected result from the existing law," she said.
The BNWLA leader also demanded heightened vigilance in every related department and in border areas to stem the tide of trafficking in humans.
Khandoker Golam Moazzem, additional research director at the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), said a channel has developed where a section of local police administration and leaders support the human traffickers as they also get the benefit.
Lower overseas employment, high migration cost in the Middle East, internal unemployment and poor vigilance in coastal areas were working behind the human-trafficking syndrome, he said.
Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit (RMMRU) chairperson Tasneem Siddiqui said trafficking has been on the increase since 2012 when the Malaysian labour market was opened.
"But the government did not take measures to prevent it," she said.
To popularize the Overseas Employment and Migrants Act 2013 the government should take publicity campaign, she suggests.
Under the act trafficked workers will get more benefit as it is enacted only for labour welfare.
Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA) president Mohammad Abul Bashar said recruiting agencies were not involved in human trafficking.
"But dishonest travel agencies might have complicity in this crime."
He also said sometimes a section of local middlemen are involved in human smuggling and "godfathers use those poor and uneducated dalals (brokers) to traffic people to Malaysia, Libya and other countries".
Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment (EWOE) Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain said when workers try to go abroad through illegal channel, they don't have proper documents. So many victims are unable to file cases against the offenders.  
Besides, sometimes they show no interest in filing case as the middlemen in most cases are their known persons.      
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