The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Mofussil bus stations key transit centres for traffickers

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jan 31, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Mofussil bus stations key transit centres for traffickers

Ramya Kannan

Scores of children rescued by volunteer groups

ALL SMILES: Kumaresan (extreme left) of Kallakuruchi, rescued by volunteers of an NGO, reunited with his family at the Koyembedu Mofussil Bus Terminus on Tuesday. — Photo: K. Pichumani

CHENNAI : The Chennai Mofussil bus terminals at Koyambedu, Egmore and Tambaram railway stations have emerged as key transit centres for children being trafficked or for those who run away from home in Tamil Nadu.

Lured by jobs

at market

Even children landing at the Central Station, another transit centre, make their way to the CMBT at Koyambedu, because they are told that there is plenty of work to be found there and at the fruit and vegetable market nearby. Just as Kumaresan, of Laknayakanpatti village near Kallakurichi in Villupuram, did last year.

He ran away to Mumbai after he had a misunderstanding with his father. In Mumbai, agents took him to a bangle-making unit where he was put to work along with 20 other children, also from Tamil Nadu.

Though he was enticed by a broker who promised him a monthly salary, at the unit, he was beaten up and denied food; he ran away from Mumbai and took a train again, travelling ticketless, to Chennai.

"When I got off at the Central, some boys told me to go to the CMBT - there would be a lot of work there. So I came here. Some people found me and took me home to my family again," Kumaresan said.

Trained security guards

At CMBT, he was spotted by one of the 90 security guards who have been trained to watch out for unaccompanied children. But Kumaresan is clearly among the lucky lot.

Kumaresan's father, Iyamperumal, who had come from Kallakurichi along with his family to thank those who rescued his son, says a number of boys from his village and the surrounding villages are still "missing" from home. Some of them had been "sold" by parents to brokers who bought them from poor landless farmers for small sums of money, and the families have not heard from them since, Iyamperumal, says.

Help desks set up

Volunteers of Saaral-CSHD and Nesakkaram SEEDS, which has established Child Help Desks at each of these centres, say they have rescued 47 children who were trafficked and 101 runaway children at CMBT. At Egmore and Tambaram, a total of 240 children, including 174 trafficked from the State, were rescued.

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