Kerala new hotspot for paedophiles

Trafficking of young boys for prostitution is on the rise with tourism hotspots like Kerala emerging as the new attraction for paedophiles, says a report. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Jan 25, 2009, 24:40:02 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Trafficking of young boys for prostitution is on the rise with tourism hotspots like Kerala emerging as the new attraction for paedophiles, says a report on Status of Indian Children, released on eve of the first National Girl Child Day.

“With the increase of paedophilia as part of sex tourism, the demand for boys is rising,” the report said.

There are, however, no major studies to understand the magnitude of the problem, as male prostitution is an underground and clandestine activity in India. While Goa has been a major destination for some years now, Kerala is emerging as the preferred destination for pedophiles.

“There have been reports of increase in number of boys being trafficked to Kerala to become part of sex trade,” said Bharati Ali of HAQ, Centre for Child Rights, the NGO that brought out the report.

Chiding the government, the report said, “Unlike Sri Lanka and Thailand, this problem has not been seriously tackled or discussed in India and has more or less shrouded in secrecy”.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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