KOLKATA: Fourteen young women were rescued from a sex racket operating under the guise of spa-cum-massage parlour in Surat, Gujarat, after one of them who had gone missing from Basanti in Bengal managed to call her relative. Of the 14 rescued, 10 are from Bengal including one, 18-year-old from Baruipur.
On February 2021, a missing diary was lodged under Basanti PS about a 21-year-old woman. In mid-March, her brother-in-law received a call from her, seeking help to rescue her from the spa in Surat where she was being forced into sex trade. The mother of two children had been lured by promise of a lucrative job at a restaurant by a local linkman. When the relative visited the mall on March 23, he was threatened and somehow managed to escape.
He then reached out to Birangana Seva Samity, a non-profit organization working to prevent child and women trafficking in South 24 Parganas. After getting information, Mission Mukti Foundation joined Rescue Foundation, Surat Child Line and Crime Branch Surat to conduct a joint raid on Friday evening.
Another woman rescued is from Baruipur PS area. Married to one Mijanur Rahman Sardar on March 18, 2021, she was forced into sex trade. However, she has has been kept in quarantine after she tested Covid positive during a health check. The others have been kept in a local rescue shelter. Sources said the other eight girls were later released after they refused to return home.