13 years old.
Kidnapped. Sold. Beaten. Drugged. Raped. Chained.
Beaten. Raped. Beaten. Raped. Beaten. Raped.
Before I began this journey on the World Race to fight human trafficking, I had heard stories about young girls in far off countries who live under the threat of being kidnapped, beaten, raped and locked up in Brothels. I had seen documentaries. I knew that type of evil existed in the world, but the girls in those stories had names I didn’t recognize and faces that remained gray, indeterminate blurs.
But then this past April I found myself sitting before Mita* in Calcutta, India listening to the story of her life. A Bengali woman of about 50 years; who, years earlier, had left the refugee camp where her family had fled to escape the Bangladeshi/Indian conflict. She and a friend, made their way to Calcutta at age 13 in search of a livelihood that would help their families survive.
I was a small girl from a village. I had never seen so many buildings! And so many people!! They were everywhere. I met a lady who was nice to me. She gave me a place to stay and new clothes. How could I have known? I thought she was nice; a good person, taking me in- a girl with nothing. Men that came to visit her bought me sodas. I had only been in Calcutta for a short time- a few days. How could I have known? I was so young. I didn’t understand anything.
A few days after I had arrived, the lady told me to dress in my new clothes. She came into my room and gave me a soda. I didn’t understand why I felt funny after drinking it. My head was spinning. I was trying to make sense of it when the lady let two men into my room. Where there were two, I saw four. I felt so funny. I didn’t understand what was happening. The men locked themselves in my room using bolts at the top of the doors. They began hitting me. They tried to take my new clothes off. I ran to the doors, but I was too small. I couldn’t unlock the doors. I couldn’t reach the locks. They threw me down. They were much bigger and older than I. How could I fight? How could I have known? I was only 13.
That was the night, as Mita describes, “That was the night my life ended.”
Sonagachi is one of Calcutta’s three notorious sex districts. This is where Mita found herself at age 13. The district of Sonagachi only stretches about one square kilometer. Within the confines of Songachi are thousands of women and girls, approximately 10,000 who “walk the line” every night. Every night an average of 30,000 Indian men flock to Songachi to purchase sexual pleasure from these women and girls.
As I walked the sex lanes of Sonagachi and looked into the dull, blank eyes of the women, faces formed and seared themselves into my mind; faces for the many stories I had heard, no longer formless, gray blurs. . . . .
The average age of a girl trafficked into Sonagachi is 11.
Initiation into Songachi involves brutal rape and beatings for weeks.
This is done to “break her spirit”.
A girl can spend 6 to 7 years locked in one room, never permitted to go outside.
Brutal injuries are often made without anesthesia to ensure a girl won’t get pregnant.
At about age 17 or 18 girls are let out of their rooms to “stand in line”.
Once a girl is “past her prime”– age 23-25: her price drops significantly,
sometimes to as little as 50 US cents per encounter.
Many girls are born into brothels without hope of a different future.
Sometimes three generations can be found prostituted from the same Madam in the same brothel at the same time.
*her name has been changed to protect her.
