Draft Anti-Trafficking Bill and Concerns
Recently ‘Trafficking in Persons (Prevention, Care and Rehabilitation) Bill, 2021’ (Anti Trafficking Bill) can be introduced in the upcoming monsoon session of Parliament.
Key points of the bill:
- The proposed bill proposes stringent punishment to offenders, under which heavy fines and confiscation of their properties can also be done.
- In this bill, along with providing protection to women and children, transgender or any other person who has been trafficked as victims has also been included.
- Provision has also been made under this draft to do away with that provision, under which in order to define a person as a ‘victim’, it is necessary to move him from one place to another.
- In addition, the definition of ‘exploitation’ includes the exploitation of others in the form of prostitution or other forms of sexual exploitation such as pornography, forced labour, any act of physical abuse, slavery or other practices such as slavery, slavery or the forcible removal of organs, etc. has been included.
This law shall apply to all the following persons:
- All citizens residing within and outside the borders of India.
- Any person on board any ship or aircraft registered in India, wherever or wherever it is, carrying Indian nationals.
- Any foreign person or stateless person resident in India at the time of committing an offense under this draft.
- Every crime of human-trafficking with cross-border implications.
- Security personnel and government servants, doctors and paramedical staff or any person holding a position of authority.
Constitutional and legislative provisions relating to trafficking in India:
- Trafficking in human or persons is prohibited under Article 23(1) of the Constitution of India.
- The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act (ITPA) is the principal law for the prevention of trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation.
- Section 370 and Section 370A of the Indian Penal Code have been replaced by IPC under the ‘Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2013’, in which comprehensive provisions have been made to combat the menace of human trafficking.
Source – PIB
