By: Dr. Mohammad Aleem, Editor-ICN Group
NEW DELHI: Yesterday, I watched by chance a documentary film on Aljazeera. It was on the human trafficking, especially on the slave brides. The story was of Haryana’s Mewat region, a predominantly Muslim area where the literacy rate is very low according to the general standard.
What pained me the most was the young innocent Muslim girls and women from the rural and backward areas of Assam being brought here by traffickers openly without any fear of the law of the land in the name of marriage, and later on, sold them to other persons. These unfortunate women and girls are known here as Paro, means brides which were bought not got by any declaration of arranged marriage.
Some women who were interviewed told that they were sold four to five times just for a petty money of five to ten thousand rupees. And they are being used by their debauch and profligate husbands not only as the sex slaves but also like bonded laborers. They were forced to work in the fields, even in the scorching summer heat just to earn their two meals a day. And after their day’s long hard labor, they were usually subjected to forced sex by their belligerent and inhuman husbands. If they ever dared to disobey their commands, they would get beaten black and blue.
One distraught woman with tears rolling down on her cheeks while narrating her ordeal to the interviewer said that she would love to meet death rather than live like a bonded sex slave in this kind of hellish environment.
My concern is that how on earth, such ignominious and cruel things take place in this modern world of civilized society? Why such practices could not be curtailed by the religious, social and governmental organizations? Who are the real culprits? Those people who resort to such cruelties or those people who have their prime duty to stop such cruelties?
Why the religious organizations like Jamat-e-Islami, Tableeghi Jamaat and Jamiatul Ulema’s Hind did not anything to stop such spiteful practices, though they command huge fan following there? Where do they live and why don’t they work in spreading the true Islamic message of love, sacrifice and bonding towards the weaker section of the society, especially, women and young girls and children?
Islam is the religion where the importance of the dignity of life of every human being has been given the prime importance. And sadly among the followers of this great religion, we find utter disregard towards these great teachings.
