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	Welcome to India, a country with 18 million slaves by Nimisha Jaiswal IRIN News, agencies   New Delhi, 28 June 2016 (Irin News)   Two years ago, a man claiming to be an employment agent approached the mother of a 19-year-old woman with an offer: her daughter could work in a New Delhi household and send money home to her impoverished family.   The mother never received a rupee, and she didn’t see her daughter for two years, until she was freed two months ago after an intervention by the NGO, Chetanalaya.   “They never gave me my money. They said the agent has run away with it,” said the young woman, who cannot be named as she is a victim of human trafficking.   She finally realised she would never be paid, and managed to call her family who then got in touch with Chetanalaya. Representatives of the NGO contacted the family who was holding the woman, and they agreed to bring her to the police station where she was finally released.   The woman is still too traumatised to speak about her experience in detail, but her story is all too common.   There are an estimated 18 million people enslaved in India, according to the annual Global Slavery Index, which was published last month by the Walk Free Foundation. That’s more than any other country and far outstrips China, which followed with about three million of the global total of 46 million people enslaved through “human trafficking, forced labour, debt bondage, forced or servile marriage or commercial sexual exploitation”.   Authorities in India recognise the problem, and the Ministry of Women and Child Development has written a new human trafficking law. But some civil society groups say the draft legislation is too focused on sex trafficking and doesn’t go far enough to protect enslaved domestic workers or crack down on employment agencies that sell women into domestic work with very little or no pay.   Chetanalaya has liberated more than 800 enslaved domestic workers over the past 15 years, but that’s just a drop in the bucket, according to legal officer Gaurav Kumar Tomar. He reckons that many of the approximately 800,000 women who cook, clean, and care for children in homes in New Delhi are working without pay.   “I can guarantee that half of them are placed through these illegal agencies and trafficked,” he said. “They easily outnumber sex workers.”   The draft legislation refers to the trafficking of women into sexual slavery, but it doesn’t mention domestic workers as a specific category of trafficked persons. It has also been criticised for restating a law that makes the registration of placement agencies compulsory, without addressing the continued evasion despite the existing law.   In the case of the young woman who was rescued recently, for example, the agent disappeared after receiving an initial payment, and the family refused to pay her unless the agent returned. No one in the family has been charged, nor has the missing agent, and advocates say such cases very rarely result in criminal prosecutions.   Agencies frequently change their names and telephone numbers to avoid receiving complaints from the girls and women they’ve placed, said Kalai Selvi, a regional coordinator with the National Domestic Workers Association.   “The agent is given one lakh ($1,500) for the year, and if he sends the family 5,000 rupees ($75), they are happy,” said Selvi. “The child is basically sold to the owners.”   Government response   The draft law makes the registration of placement agencies compulsory.   “We will be developing rules that monitor where agents are getting the workers from, where these workers are being placed,” said Silky Grewal, a senior consultant at the ministry.   While the legislation does not specifically refer to domestic workers, Grewal said they are already covered under the penal code, which refers to trafficking “for the purpose of servitude”.   That doesn’t go far enough for Tomar, of Chetanalaya.   “I have seen horrific cases where girls are enslaved for decades together, where they are not allowed to step out or speak to anyone else,” he said. “The new law must identify domestic workers to empower them.”   Civil society groups are preparing to submit their recommendations to the Ministry of Women and Child Development. An updated version of the law will then be sent to other relevant ministries for their input, and the legislation is expected to be debated in parliament this year.   http://www.irinnews.org/news/2016/06/28/welcome-india-country-18-million-slaves http://tmsnrt.rs/2l2bgfk   May 2016 (2016 Global Slavery Index)   An estimated 45.8 million men, women and children around the world are today trapped in modern slavery – 28% more than previously estimated. They are enslaved through human trafficking, forced labour, debt bondage, forced or servile marriage or commercial sexual exploitation. This is revealed in the 2016 Global Slavery Index, the flagship research report published today by the Walk Free Foundation.   North Korea is the country with the greatest prevalence of modern slavery, with 4.37% of its population estimated to be enslaved. It is also the country with the weakest government response in terms of actions taken to combat modern slavery. The next highest prevalence of slavery is found in Uzbekistan (3.97%), followed by Cambodia (1.65%).   In terms of absolute numbers, India remains the highest with an estimated 18.35 million enslaved people, followed by China (3.39m), Pakistan (2.13m), Bangladesh (1.53m) and Uzbekistan (1.23m). Combined, these five countries account for almost 58% of the world’s enslaved, or 26.6 million people.   The 2016 Global Slavery Index estimates that 28% more people are enslaved than reported in the 2014 edition. This significant increase is due to enhanced data collection and research methodology. Survey research for the 2016 Global Slavery Index included over 42,000 interviews conducted in 53 languages across 25 countries, including 15 state-level surveys in India. These representative surveys cover 44% of the global population.   The Global Slavery Index also tracks government actions and responses to modern slavery. Of the 161 assessed, 124 countries have criminalised human trafficking in line with the UN Trafficking Protocol and 96 have developed national action plans to coordinate government response.   Some progress has been made by many governments since the publication of the 2014 report. The UK Government introduced the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and has appointed an Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner. President Barack Obama closed a loophole in US law to now ban the importation of goods made with forced or child labour.   While India has more people enslaved than any other country, it has made some progress in introducing measures to tackle the problem. It has criminalised trafficking, slavery, forced labour, child prostitution and forced marriage. The Indian government is revising legislation against human trafficking, with tougher punishment for repeat offenders. It will offer victims protection and recovery support.   http://www.globalslaveryindex.org/download/ http://50forfreedom.org/blog/category/stories/ http://www.walkfree.org/forced-labour/ http://www.antislavery.org/english/slavery_today/default.aspx http://www.freetheslaves.net/
	State-owned enterprises must lead by example on business and human rights by UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights   17 June 2016   Governments seem to forget that they are economic actors in their own right, said a United Nations expert group today, while urging States “to lead by example on business and human rights, starting with those enterprises closest to them - State-owned enterprises.”   “Governments are currently sending an incoherent message to businesses,” said human rights expert Dante Pesce, who chairs the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights, during the presentation of the group’s latest report to the UN Human Rights Council.   “On the one hand, they ask private businesses to respect human rights, and increasingly set out such expectations in law and policy,” Mr. Pesce noted. “On the other hand – barring notable exceptions – they show no great desire to use the means at their disposal to ensure that those enterprises they own or control respect human rights.”   Many States the world over manage large portfolios on State-owned enterprises (SOEs), which have risen as significant actors in the global economy, active at home and abroad in diverse sectors such as energy, utilities, infrastructure, transports, telecommunications, and banking. The proportion of SOEs among Fortune Global 500 companies has grown from 9.8% in 2005 to 22.8% in 2014, with US$389.3 billion of profit and US$28.4 trillion in assets.   The performance of SOEs on issues of governance and human rights is mixed, with reported cases of corruption and lack of transparency, and harm caused to workers and communities throughout SOEs’ operations. “Yet these human rights impacts - and the duties of States to protect against them - remain largely ignored,” Mr. Pesce explained.   In its report, the Working Group clarifies how States should behave in their role as company owners and suggests measures that they should take to ensure SOEs fully respect human rights.   “It is high time for States to show concrete leadership, and require the enterprises they own or control to be role models on human rights,” the expert stressed. “Doing so is part of States’ international legal obligations, and it will only reinforce the legitimacy of States’ expectations towards private businesses.” Visit the related web page
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