On Monday, nine adult girls who were lodged at the protective home in Merces overpowered a staffer and a lady police constable and escaped. The Old Goa police
tracked down three of the girls from Mumbai and Bangladesh and returned them to the care of the home. All the girls were ‘rescued’ by the police in raids on prostitution dens where they were employed as sex workers. In the normal course, the girls are kept at the protective home and handed over to next of kin. In reality, it is the pimps, posing as family members, who take them away with connivance of the girl. Now why would nine
girls want to escape from the custody of the protective home? And what would they do once outside? Get jobs or go back to prostitution? Their escape points to glaring lapses in the protective home. If prostitution seems better than living in a protective
home, then something is clearly amiss. While the police
are doing their duty in busting brothels, there appears to
be no system in place to rehabilitate the girls who are rescued.
The government must institute an inquiry into the manner in
which the protective home is run and ascertain what can be
done to rehabilitate the girls or dispatch them to their respective
countries or states.
