Kids 'mortgaged' to repay loans: NHRC notice to Odisha, Telangana

BHUBANESWAR: The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has sought action-taken reports from the chief secretaries of Odisha and Telangana within four weeks, taking cognisance of a petition that highlighted instances of poor widowed mothers being forced to surrender their children as bonded labourers as they were unable to repay loans.
The petition was filed by human rights activist and lawyer Radhakanta Tripathy last month."The government should ensure such incidents do not happen in the future," he said.
The petition contains two heartrending tales of modern slavery.
Shukadev Parabhue of Odisha's Balangir district was working at a brick kiln near Hyderabad when he fell ill and died on March 8. His wife brought the body home for the last rites.
She came with her six-year-old son, but was forced to leave her 12-year-old daughter behind as a mortgage because Shukadev had taken a loan of Rs 60,000 from the kiln's owner.
The Balangir district administration has rescued Shukadev's daughter from the brick kiln, the petitioner said. Sabitri Nayak, a tribal woman from Gadhuli village in Keonjhar district, had borrowed Rs 5,000 from a neighbour to pay for her husband's cremation and death rituals on January 26, 2016.
Unable to repay, the mother of three was forced to mortgage two of her sons, aged 13 and 11. They tended the neighbour's cattle and did other chores for more than a month before they were set free.