Operation Muskan-VII: Rachakonda police's Anti-Human Trafficking Unit rescues 20 children

Hyderabad: The Anti-Human Trafficking Unit (AHTU) rescued 20 child labourers from the Rachakonda police commissionerate limits on 12 July as part of its Operation Muskan-VII. It has also registered cases against the companies and establishments for employing minors.

In the first case, the AHTU team along with Malkajgiri division OM-VII team, She Team, and child line officials jointly raided Krishna Pharma company at Devender Nagar Colony in Uppal and rescued 10 minor children – four girls and six boys. Three of the rescued children were from Uttar Pradesh, one from Maharashtra, three from Andhra Pradesh and three from Telangana.

The teams found that the company was hiring child labourers from various states and exploiting them as cheap labour. The children were hired to pack sanitizer bottles and worked for over nine hours for Rs. 200 a day. A case has been registered under various sections of the IPC and Juvenile Justice Act against the company owner Gambali Mallikarjuna Rao (60).

In the second case, the Ibrahimpatnam division OM-VII team and other officials jointly conducted rescue operations in Maheshwaram town under the limits of Maheshwaram police station and rescued 10 minor boys. Two of them were from Bihar and eight were from Telangana. They worked in motorbike repair shops, fast food centres, and bakeries.