The Mumbai Crime Branch on Thursday arrested three people and rescued a 20-day-old girl who was allegedly brought from Bihar to be sold into a flesh trade racket in the city.
Crime Branch officers said the racket is similar to the one they had busted in 2016, where girls were sold to pimps when they were only a few days old, raised by them, and then pressed into prostitution when they would come of age.
Fazal
Assistant police inspector Sharad Dharade with Unit IX received a tip-off that a minor girl was going to be sold to a flesh trade racket operator near Qureshi Nagar slum in Bandra. A team led by police inspectors Mahesh Desai and Sunil Jadhav laid a trap and intercepted three suspects along with a 20-day-old girl in the afternoon.
“Their questioning established that one of the two women, Sharifa Pathan (50), had brought the girl from Bihar, while the man was her brother Fazal (23). They were going to hand the girl over to the third accused, Afreen Khan (23), who stays in Govandi,” an officer said.
Afreen Khan
The officer said Ms. Pathan had promised the victim’s mother ₹25,000 in exchange for her daughter, and had paid her ₹10,000 as advance.
The officer said, “Girls are sold to pimps at a very young age and for the first seven to eight years, the pimps raise the girls in their houses while also making them do the housework. Once they reach a certain age, which is way below the legal age for prostitution, they are sold to the highest bidder, as virgins fetch a very high price in the flesh trade market.”
The officer said there is a psychological advantage to this method, as the victims grow up believing that the pimps are their parents, grow dependant on them for their basic needs, and hence don’t oppose them when they are sold.
“The pimps are also able to groom the victim right from their childhood, ensuring they get a fat payment when it is time to make the sale,” the officer said.
In 2016, the Crime Branch had busted a similar racket where girls were raised by agents who sold them into the dance bar circuit after they hit puberty.
All the three accused have been arrested and charged under the Prevention of Immoral Trafficking Act, while the police are trying to track down the victim’s mother.
“We suspect Ms. Khan has done this before and conducting further inquiries to probe this aspect. All of her family members and friends are being questioned to find out who else is involved in the racket,” the officer said.
