Bonded Slavery In Plain Sight: Exposing India’s Feudal Past |
It should shock the conscience of the country that modern-day slavery in the form of bonded labour continues to exist in different states, a full 50 years after the passing of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1976. The report from Mandi in the Muzaffarnagar district, Uttar Pradesh, of a group of workers kept captive, beaten, branded with rods, fed rotis made of animal feed and terrorised using attack dogs in an industrial unit is nothing short of an indictment of the official machinery that is entrusted with the protection of fundamental rights. Only the credulous can accept the explanation that it took the escape of one worker to expose the horror when it is clear that the owners of the unit were regularly staking out........