Bijoy (identify modified) from Sikkim, was elated when his dad and mom lastly agreed to let him go on a visit together with his associates to Siliguri. In October 2023, the group of 16-year-olds made their technique to the West Bengal city with plans for an important weekend.
Little did Bijoy or his dad and mom anticipate the nightmare that was to observe.
When the group of boys returned to Sikkim, they have been one brief. Bijoy was lacking. Frantic, his father referred to as the one man he knew might assist — Raju Nepali. One thing of a hero within the Dooars area of West Bengal, Raju is the primary dialled variety of any father or mother who’s unable to hint their ward.
He was fast to calm a dishevelled father or mother down as he outlined the subsequent greatest plan of action. “We have to file a grievance with the Sikkim Police Division,” he mentioned.
Whereas assuring Bijoy’s father that he would assist discover Bijoy, Raju was already drafting a WhatsApp message with the boy’s image. A number of seconds later, 230 folks have been notified in regards to the lacking boy. This included journalists, police, social employees, and attorneys throughout India who sprung into motion.
The subsequent few weeks have been a busy time for the members of the group. As they found, the boy was lured by a drug peddler and brought to Bhagalpur, Bihar, the place he was crushed. “The dad and mom have been flooded with messages for a ransom of Rs 1 lakh in the event that they needed to see their little one once more,” recollects Raju. Environment friendly monitoring utilizing cellular networks led the police to the placement, from the place the boy was lastly rescued.
Sharing the concept of the WhatsApp group ‘Cease If You Can’, Raju emphasises that it’s a trendy answer to curb human trafficking — a speedy one in distinction to the extra antiquated options which in any other case trigger confounding delays to find the lacking little one.
Each little one reunited with their dad and mom is a milestone for Raju, now in his late fifties, who was as soon as clueless about his future when he failed Class 7. However immediately, he’s a shining success.
![Raju Nepali trains the youth across West Bengal about the evils of human trafficking](https://en-media.thebetterindia.com/uploads/2024/03/human-trafficking--1710158042.jpg)
A missionary in Nepal
The WhatsApp group that was profitable in tracing Bijoy is a part of the NGO Duars Specific Mail arrange by Raju in 2007. Via its networks, the NGO has efficiently rescued over 1,500 youngsters thus far.
“However we have now protected over a lakh youngsters,” provides Raju. Profitable on the degree of coverage and observe, Duars Specific Mail is a joint collaboration between Raju and anti-trafficking activists, Rangu Souriya and Nirnay John.
As Raju spends his day figuring out plans of motion to sort out the trafficking circumstances that come their means, he says three many years in the past his life regarded very completely different. As a missionary, Raju’s work concerned travelling to the remotest components of India, particularly to areas that have been going through peace conflicts. It was on one in every of these journeys to Nepal in 1992, that Raju and a younger woman turned associates. The 2 struck a powerful friendship and she or he regarded as much as him as an elder brother, inviting him to her engagement when it was fastened.
Whereas Raju attended the engagement, he gave the marriage a miss as he had returned to his house in West Bengal. “I used to be completely satisfied for her. Nevertheless it by no means struck me to search out out extra in regards to the boy she was going to marry or his background,” he recollects, including that on a go to to the woman’s house later he realised his mistake. “Her dad and mom had misplaced contact together with her. They instructed me she had not had any communication with them for the reason that wedding ceremony and neither means was the boy reachable.”
![Raju Nepali, the founder of Duars Express Mail goes door-to-door in West Bengal educating families about human trafficking and telling them to safeguard their girls](https://en-media.thebetterindia.com/uploads/2024/03/human-trafficking-1-1710158127.jpg)
The household was distraught. Whereas Raju helped them file a police grievance, there have been no results in go additional, till eight years later when he was in Pune!
As soon as once more on missionary work, Raju recollects how that day modified the course of his life without end. “I used to be at one of many dhabas in Pune and felt a faucet on my shoulder. Once I turned to see who it was, I didn’t recognise the girl,” he shares.
However when she reminded him about their conversations and her engagement, Raju remembered. She was the identical woman who was lacking. Because the woman narrated her story of how she was duped by the person she married and delivered to Pune the place she was compelled to work in a crimson gentle space, Raju was shocked. “It was the primary time I had heard about human trafficking,” he shares.
A vicious circle
![Duars Express Mail is a joint initiative between Raju Nepali and other anti-human trafficking NGOs in West Bengal](https://en-media.thebetterindia.com/uploads/2024/03/human-trafficking-2-1710158216.jpg)
Over the subsequent few weeks, Raju regarded for assist for the woman and instructed her household, pondering they might be completely satisfied he discovered her. However within the course of, he got here to grasp that the evils of human trafficking prolong past the apparent purview. “Once I instructed this woman’s dad and mom the story she had instructed me, they have been reluctant to take her again as she had been working in a crimson gentle space. This made me realise the significance of counselling in such circumstances, each for the sufferer and the household,” he says.
Sadly, the woman succumbed to the HIV she had contracted inside a number of weeks of Raju discovering her. “My buddy had misplaced her life. I needed to make sure nobody else was a sufferer of this destiny,” he notes.
With this as the muse for Duars Specific Mail, Raju started networking with anybody in West Bengal who might assist him perceive extra in regards to the channels of human trafficking. As he quickly learnt, in line with an NCRB Report, between 2019 to 2021, the variety of lacking youngsters in West Bengal elevated by 22 p.c.
![Through the efforts of Duars Express Mail over 1500 children have been rescued](https://en-media.thebetterindia.com/uploads/2024/03/human-trafficking-3-1710158299.jpg)
The state of affairs is grim. The Nationwide Crime Information Bureau (NCRB) information ranks West Bengal tenth in human trafficking. “One thing wanted to be achieved,” thought Raju.
In the present day, the work of Duars Specific Mail is prolonged however not restricted to the safety and rescue of victims of human trafficking.
Elaborating on the method adopted, he says, “Each time the dad and mom of a lacking little one come to us, I first advise them to go to the police station and file a ‘lacking’ grievance or a ‘kidnapping’ grievance in case of a minor. Then together with the police and social employees, we draw up a suspect sheet as to who the kid was final seen with and the place they have been headed. We additionally strive tracing the placement via cellular.”
![The WhatsApp group 'Stop If You Can' started by Raju Nepali has a network of over 250 journalists, police, lawyers and activists who are a part of it](https://en-media.thebetterindia.com/uploads/2024/03/inspiration-1-1710162403.jpg)
As soon as the placement has been ascertained, the workforce traces the closest railway station within the state and offers the closest police station the lead. The WhatsApp group expedites the method. With folks from pan India and even Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh, the group is a holistic community, and with so many minds working, finding the kid turns into simpler.
Raju provides that when a toddler is rescued, the District Justice of the Peace decides whether or not the kid wants counselling and may go house or must be positioned in a shelter. It’s this second that he waits for. Each case solved is a win for Raju, and he’s glad he can step in.
“Kids who’re trafficked lose hope of ever returning house, however seeing their smiles after their ordeal is the happiest second for me,” he remarks.
Edited by Pranita Bhat