Saturday, Feb 05, 2005
Saturday, Feb 05, 2005 |
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Advts: Classifieds | Employment | New Delhi
Devesh K. Pandey
The abduction of an 18-month-old boy allegedly by his maid from his residence in South Delhi has once again underlined the need to have in place a proper mechanism to verify domestic helps as well as the placement agencies by some government body. In a cosmopolitan city like Delhi where the social fabric is gradually disintegrating due to proliferation of nuclear families, the role of domestic helps in a family has assumed enormous importance. They are entrusted with every kind of task including looking after the children of working couples. In a way, people have become dependent on them for every small household activity. Not long ago, people had no option but to employ domestic helps on a part-time basis for lack of manpower. But with the migration of thousands of job aspirants in the recent past -- mostly from the eastern parts of the country -- full-time domestic helps have become easily available. Realising that there was a huge demand for domestic helps in the Capital, placement agencies also started mushrooming across the city, bringing in young men and women from the tribal areas of Chhattishgarh, Orissa, West Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand. The Delhi police strongly suspect that some of these agencies plant domestic helps in posh colonies and the latter after winning the confidence of their employers send out information on the basis of which thefts and robberies are committed. According to the Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (South Delhi), Anil Shukla, there have been instances where domestic helps have been found hand in glove with criminals. On numerous occasions, they have drugged their employers and even killed them before escaping with valuables. In some cases, they have even passed on vital information to criminal elements to commit robberies. That is not all. Several placement agencies even supply minors as domestic helps most of whom end up being exploited. Lately some human trafficking gangs have been found running prostitution rackets in the garb of domestic help placement agencies and are even forcing minors into the flesh trade. Due to a steep rise in cases of crime involving domestic helps, the Delhi police had introduced the concept of servant verification a few years ago. However, it has not proved very effective in the case of those coming from other States because verification of their antecedents becomes a lengthy and tedious process. In addition, several employers refuse to get their helps verified by the police fearing that they would run away. Besides, the absence of any surveillance on the activities of placement agencies has complicated matters. In view of all this, the time has come for the Government to formulate laws to regulate the domestic help placement agencies in the Capital. Procedures can be laid down to facilitate free registration of placement agencies and certification of helps after proper investigation of their antecedents and registration of details of their family members and friends. Such an arrangement would help the enforcement agencies track down those indulging in criminal activities.
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