The Maharashtra Police will request Interpol to issue a red-corner notice (RCN) against three fugitives who allegedly trafficked young women from the State, Minister of State for Home Ranjit Patil said on Thursday.
Speaking in the Legislative Council, Mr. Patil said the fugitives are wanted in a recently busted international racket operating from Mumbai, in which women were trafficked to Dubai and Bahrain. “We will ask Interpol to issue an RCN against them as they cannot be directly arrested. The guilty will be punished,” he said.
The Nagpada police had on October 29 busted an international trafficking ring operating from the city. As many as 38 women were found to be trafficked to Dubai and Bahrain, and forced into prostitution or to work at dance bars in the Middle East. The Mumbai Crime Branch had also seized 52 passports from Farid Shah, the 55-year-old kingpin of the racket. Three others operated as middlemen from outside India.
Luring jobseekers
The accused would lure young women with a proposition of employment as helps in canteens and offices, charging them anywhere between ₹1 lakh to ₹2 lakh.
Leader of the Opposition Dhananjay Munde and MLCs Vidya Chavan, Vikram Kale and Hemant Takle had raised the issue in the House. “We want to know what action the government has taken to bring back these young women from the foreign land. The government must give us a suitable answer,” they said.
Monitoring cells
Mr. Patil replied that the government has established cells to monitor human trafficking from Mumbai, Pune, Thane, Navi Mumbai, Ahmednagar, Beed and other urban and semi-urban areas, from where many women are being taken. “One of the accused in the racket is believed to be in Kenya. We will make every possible effort to bring her back, along with all others guilty of trafficking women and girls from Maharashtra,” the Minister said.
On Tuesday, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis told the Assembly that between 2013 and 2017, the Mumbai Police recorded 26,708 cases of missing and kidnapped girls and women, of which 2,264 are yet to be solved.