Slavery in India

India is the most enslaved country in the world, with home to over 18 million slaves. Slavery is pretty much everywhere in India. They are forced into domestic work, farming, construction, forced begging, labour, fishing and the sex industry. These people can not refuse or leave, because of the violence and abuse they will suffer if they do leave. In India, children also are forced into exploitation and forced marriage. In the 27-46 million people that are still enslaved, 58% of these people are slaves in India, China, Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Bangladesh. Below is a picture of the population of modern day slavery. As you can see, there are still a fair amount of enslaved people. especially in India! Around 1.4% of Indians live

as modern day slaves. India has quite a lot of poverty, and therefore, this has forced people in India to work as bonded labourers and prostitutes. They are also often forced into begging. These people work long hours for seven days a week. Forced marriage is also just another way to force young girls into trafficking.

The Indian government is trying to launch an anti trafficking bill, which will treat survivors as victims and not criminals. So, the traffickers and trafficked are both sent to jail. This bill has a lot penalties for offences such as administering drugs and alcohol to those who are trafficked.

Slaves are only paid enough to work for just another day. The key factor that makes slavery so common in India, is vulnerability. For example, all of those poor Indians that live in villages that are suffering from poverty. More than 140 slave holders in India have been arrested in 2014-2015.

Source: https://qz.com/695565/india-has-18-million-modern-slaves-at-least-five-times-more-than-any-other-country-in-the-world/

Other helpful websites:

http://www.freetheslaves.net/where-we-work/india/