I AM a daughter, a sister, a wife and a mother. But, more than that, I am a woman and a human being. However, it is shattering how people sell women like chattels to repay their loans. Debt bondage is an untold misery that gives rise to slavery, poverty, discrimination and social exclusion.

Article 11 of the Constitution forbids slavery and forced labour, and considers them crimes. Similarly, debt bondage is proscribed by the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act of 1992, but no one is punished for this crime.

Debt bondage occurs when a person is forced into labour and exploited. They are tricked by perpetrators into paying off their debt through forced labour, forced marriages, confiscation of land or other inhumane means. Hundreds of thousands of people continue to live and work under duress to repay loans.

In 1998, 11 family members of Mannu Bheel, a poor peasant belonging to the scheduled caste, were abducted in broad daylight from a farm in Jhuddo taluka in Mirpurkhas district, possibly due to non-payment of a loan. The family is still missing and no one knows whether it is dead or alive. Pakistan needs strict implementation of laws in this regard. No one should suffer the fate of Mannu Bheel.

Jawaria Sajjad
Islamabad

Published in Dawn, April 27th, 2022