Child trafficking soars: Alarming rise in Delhi

A recent study by Games24x7 and the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF) has revealed distressing statistics on child trafficking in India, with Uttar Pradesh (UP), Bihar, and Andhra Pradesh (AP) identified as the top three states with the highest number of trafficked children between 2016 and 2022. Meanwhile, Delhi has witnessed an alarming 68 per cent increase in child trafficking cases from the pre to post-Covid periods. The comprehensive report, titled ‘Child Trafficking in India: Insights from Situational Data Analysis and the Need for Tech-driven Intervention Strategies,’ was released on ‘World Day Against Trafficking in Persons’ and exposed the severity of the child trafficking crisis in the country.
The study drew data from KSCF and its partners’ interventions in child trafficking cases across 262 districts in 21 states from 2016 to 2022, providing a comprehensive overview of the current trends and patterns in child trafficking. The research covered a sample size of 13,549 children under the age of 18 who were rescued during this period.
The findings revealed that 80 per cent of the rescued children were aged between 13 and 18 years, 13 per cent were aged nine to 12 years, and over 2 per cent were even younger than nine years, indicating that child trafficking affects children of various age groups. Additionally, the report shed light on industries where child labour is rampant. Hotels and dhabas employed the highest number of child labourers (15.6 per cent), followed by the automobile or transport industry (13 per cent), and garments (11.18 per cent). Shockingly, children as young as five and eight years were found to be engaged in the cosmetic industry. While the report highlighted a significant surge in child trafficking cases across various states, UP stood out with a staggering increase in incidents. The number of reported incidents in the pre-Covid phase (2016-2019) was 267, but it rose sharply to 1214 in the post-Covid phase (2021-2022). Similarly, Karnataka witnessed an 18-fold increase, soaring from 6 to 110 reported incidents.