BANGLADESH INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL AND STRATEGIC STUDIES

VULNERABLE BODIES AND DARK NETWORKS OF TRAFFICKING: TRADE IN HUMANS AT THE BANGLADESH - INDIA BORDER

Author: Hosna J Shewly

DOI Link: DOI: https://www.doi.org/10.56888/BIISSj2013v34n1a1

ABSTRACT

Globally, trafficking is now a thriving and multi-billion dollar business run by organised criminal networks. An estimated 8, 00,000 women and children are trafficked each year across international borders, 80 percent ending in forced sex work. Although awareness is increasing, human trafficking still lack a global understanding of the subject, what United Nations Office on Drug and Crime identifies as ‘a knowledge crisis about a crime that shames us all’. Bangladesh is predominantly an origin country for victims of trafficking while India is an origin, transit and destination country for this organised crime. In this context, Bangladesh-India border, the fifth longest land border of the world, is intensively used for women and girls trafficking in South Asia. The traffickers capitalise on complex political landscape of the border and borderland, poor border control mechanisms and lack of joint efforts to stop human trafficking. This paper contributes to the efforts to prevent human trafficking along this border. The main thrust of this article is to address the routes and networks of trafficking at the Bangladesh-India border, which is poorly addressed in academic writing. Here, this paper highlights on the aspects of human trafficking along this border and prioritises on joint initiatives by the border guards to reduce the magnitude of human trafficking significantly.