21st Century Slavery

When the word slavery comes to mind most people think of it

as something of the past. It conjures an image of half-naked
labourers cowering under the whip of their colonial masters. It
is considered as something that has been abolished, overcome.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. It exists even today
and on an even larger scale than before. Human trafficking is
the third largest organised crime after drugs and arms trade.
Almost 30 million people are victims of trafficking around the
world.
Nearly 75% of the victims of trafficking are females aged 15
and above. The traffickers use violence, threats, lies, debt
bondage etc., to make the victims perform commercial sexual
acts. They are taken to an alien environment where their only
familiar sight is their captor. He then proceeds to convince or
coerce the victims into prostitution. Any attempt to escape or
alert the authorities ends with severe punishment. The victims
have no choice but to obey their captors. Nearly 20,000 women
in India alone are the victims of sex trafficking each year.
Prostitution is legal in several countries but sex slavery isnt.
The authorities must take steps to ensure that the workers are
working of their own free will.
Many traffickers go to rural areas and offer the residents the
exciting prospect of working abroad. On paper the money looks
really good for 8 hour working days with weekends off. The
victims, most of them illiterate agree to the conditions and sign
the documents. It is after they go abroad that they realize that
the working conditions are bad. Their documents are seized
and so they cannot contact the authorities for risk of being
considered as an illegal immigrant. They somehow continue to
work under horrifying conditions for the duration of their stay.
Later they realize that the food and accommodation are not

free. By the time they go home they discover that after

deducting the travel expenses they had been paid practically
nothing for their work. Nearly 14 million people are victims of
forced labour worldwide.

The third most common reason for human trafficking is the

organ trade. The usual victims are vagrants and derelicts
preferably young adults. They are kidnapped and drugged. By
the time they regain consciousness their organs are already
gone. The organ trade is a 900 million dollar industry.
Children are the prime target for traffickers as they can be
easily manipulated. Every 8 minutes a child goes missing in
India. They are treated as organ banks and cheap labour.
People say we live in the age of progress. Progress isnt virtual
reality headsets and self driving cars, progress is freedom.
There are millions of men, women and children around the
world who dont have the right to choose. Till they are free our
society can never truly make any progress. Until then, we are
shackled. Right now Mankind is like a rocking horse, were
moving all right but are we moving forward?