New Delhi : The Delhi High Court Wednesday expressed strong displeasure at the city government’s failure to bring in a law to regulate placement agencies operating in the capital.
A division bench of Chief Justice G. Rohini and Justice R.S. Endlaw summoned the labour secretary to personally appear before it Sep 30 while taking strong note of the issue that girls were being trafficked in the guise of placement agencies.
The bench asked the labour secretary to explain why no concrete steps have been taken till date to implement its order passed in December last year to regulate placement agencies.
The court also took note of the submissions made by advocate Prabhsahay Kaur, appearing for NGO Bachpan Bachao Andolan, that Delhi Police Sep 9 rescued three girls trafficked from Jharkhand, including a minor, from being auctioned by a ‘placement agency’.
The bench refused to accept the Delhi government’s submission that it was waiting for the Delhi Private Placement Agencies (Regulation) Bill to be passed, which will regulate agencies that supply domestic help.
In December 2013, the high court asked the city government to issue an executive direction to register all placement agencies and maintain salary records of employees.
This executive directive was to remain in force till the bill was passed.
However, even after seven months, the Delhi government has not issued any directive to curb the menace of women and minors being trafficked through placement agencies, argued advocate Kaur.
Kaur told the bench that despite repeated direction by the court, no concrete steps have been taken by the city government to register all placement agencies.
She cited newspaper reports which claimed that over 10,000 illegal placement agencies were operating in Delhi.
The NGO earlier said that many of the illegal placement agencies often lure poor people from remote corners of states such as West Bengal, Odisha and Jharkhand.