Want action against rackets trapping young women: Jaleel

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen state president and former Aurangabad MP Syed Imtiaz Jaleel on Wednesday demanded action against rackets involved in trapping and selling young women to other states only to be enslaved or forcefully married off.
Citing that in 2023, a total of 188 young girls and women were either kidnapped or found to be missing from the city, and another 111 from Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar district since January this year, Jaleel demanded an all-out action against such rackets.
Addressing a news conference, Syed, who was accompanied by a burqa-clad 20-year-old woman rescued with the help of Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar police from Madhya Pradesh, also shared the photo of a suspected man playing a key role in the racket.
Syed stated that irrespective of the victims’ faith, these women were being forced to marry the men who would purchase them by signing an agreement on bond papers. “We were stunned to find that about 70 per cent of women who were forced into prostitution in and around Indore were trafficked from Maharashtra,” said Syed.
The former MP said that it was on May 13 that the young woman left home and reached Aurangabad railway station to head to Parbhani, where her relatives stayed.
On reaching the railway station, the woman was approached by a middle-aged couple, who, after enquiring about her, offered her water laced with sedatives, leaving her unconscious. When she regained consciousness, she found she was in Mumbai. The couple, along with another woman, took her to various places, including Indore, Ujjain, and Morka, where she was sold for Rs 1.50 lakh.
“A contact there learnt about the victim from Aurangabad and alerted us,” said Syed.
The city police, after taking cognizance of the incident, sent a couple of constables along with some AIMIM workers to Morka, where police coordinated with their counterparts and managed to rescue the victim after several hours.