Lucknow: In independent India, rampant poverty is one of the worst forms of tortures and living in poverty is a curse. Just toiling hard to make ends meet is not enough. In exchange for a few morsels of food and some money, the powerful and the wealthy don’t hesitate to trade off young girls and sexually exploit them. This is hell on earth.

About 700 km from the national capital in Uttar Pradesh’s Bundelkhand region is Chitrakoot. Here, minor girls from poor tribal families are forced to work in illegal mines for survival but the contractors and middlemen don’t pay them their wages easily. These girls have to trade off their bodies in exchange for their meagre wages. Poverty here is so entrenched that at an age when children ideally spend their time playing merrily and attending school, these girls have to shoulder their family’s responsibilities and contribute to the household income.

Aged 12-14 years, these girls work in illegal mines where their contractors and middlemen force them to sell their bodies for a meagre daily wage of Rs 200-Rs 300. A National News Channel visited Chitrakoot to unearth the unholy nexus of money and sexual torture.

Soumya (name changed), a resident of Karvi village says when they go to the mines seeking work, the contractors agree to employ them on the condition that they will also have to sell their bodies. "We are helpless, we agree to it. They give us a job, exploit us and then don’t pay us our wages in full. When we refuse their sexual advances, they threaten they will not employ us any longer. What will we eat if we don’t work? We eventually agree to their terms"

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