INDIA BEATS
On a crusade
SUSHANTA TALUKDAR
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Ela Sangma now fights against trafficking and sexual exploitation of women.
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Brave heart: Ela Sangma
AT 16, she broke free from the clutches of flesh traders of Delhi's infamous G.B. Road. Ela Sangma is now a resource person for those combating human trafficking and sexual exploitation of women and children.
Ela's story began in 1996 when Pravin Pundit came to her village Garo Basti near Bhalukpung, Arunachal Pradesh. He offered to take the 11-year-old girl to Delhi and get her a job as a domestic worker. With six children and little money, Ela's mother agreed.
Forced to leave
The little girl, who overheard the conversation, initially refused to accompany him but had to give in when her mother firmly told her that she would go to Delhi if Ela did not. "I did not want my mother to take on more trouble. So I agreed to accompany the man to Delhi."
The graphic descriptions of how she was sold for Rs. 25,000 and then forced into prostitution in a Delhi brothel, which she gives at state level consultations on anti-trafficking always leave the participants — bureaucrats, officials of law enforcing agencies, NGO workers — dumbstruck.
Ela got a fresh lease of life in 2001. Rescued during a police raid in the brothels of G.B. Road, she was sent to Nirmal Chhaya Observation Home for Girls. In 2003, Ela was handed over to the Shillong-based Impulse NGO Network.
Wanting to help other teenaged girls break free from the clutches of flesh traders, she began to look beyond the struggle to stand on her own feet with the skills learnt at Nirmal Chhaya and Impulse.
"I decided that I must narrate my story wherever I go instead of suppressing it for fear of being thrown out of society. I believe my story would make elders, especially the police, aware of the menace of trafficking. They can rescue girls like me from the flesh traders and save others from falling prey to the traffickers."
Much response
Hasina Kharbhih, who heads Impulse NGO Network, says, "We generally keep the identities of victims a secret, but Ela agreed to help us. This has made a lot of difference to our campaign. Instead of our resource people presenting her case study, Ela narrates her own story. This has got us a better response."
Ela lost her childhood and her family. But she wants to protect other children from losing their childhood, for which she pleads for assistance.
Plea for help
"I want assistance from the government; from the police. I want their help to bring all those traffickers to book. They have destroyed our lives. In Delhi, I saw a policeman when I got off the train. I asked him if the place was safe. Had he been sensitive enough to suspect foul play and stopped us that day, I would not have fallen prey to the flesh traders."
She insists that if the police do not come forward, it is not possible for victims of trafficking to lead a normal life even after being rescued by an NGO.
Ela has seen many policemen conniving with the traffickers and abusing many helpless girls, although she has also met many who are ready to help such victims. She is willing to give evidence in the case against the man who sold her so that he can be convicted. However, Ela says, the traffickers followed her when she went back to Delhi to give evidence.
After travelling length and breadth of the northeast and also to places like Banglaore in her crusade against human trafficking, Ela is now planning to travel beyond the boundaries of India.
"I have applied for a passport. I now want to travel to other countries to narrate my tale, so that girls in those countries too can be saved from falling prey to the traffickers," she says in a determined voice.
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