Child trafficking in state up 18 fold after Covid pandemic: Report

Bengaluru, NT Bureau: An avoidable data has revealed that Karnataka has seen an 18-fold increase in reported child trafficking cases between 2016 and 2022, as per a report released jointly by Games24x7 and Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF) on Sunday.

The report reveals that the number of such cases went up from 6 to 11 in the State. It has also been found that the majority of the victims were girls, and the most common factor of these cases was forced labour and forced prostitution.

Number-wise, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Andhra Pradesh take the first three places among states in the country that reported child trafficking cases from 2016 to 2022.

In Uttar Pradesh, there were 267 such cases before Covid, which spiked to 1,214 cases in the period. The report also reveals that the cases spiked 68 per cent from pre to post Covid in Delhi.

As many as 15 per cent of the victims were found to have ended up working in eateries, followed by the automobile industry, where 13 per cent of them landed.

Out of 13,549 children rescued from 2016 to 2022, over 80 per cent of them were from the age group 13 to 18 years, while 13 per cent fall in the 9 to 12 age group, as many as 274 were aged 5-8 years, and 31 less than 5 years’ old.