In a joint operation with Jammu and Kashmir police, the Delhi Police busted a human trafficking racket that was allegedly forcing several children into bonded domestic labour in Srinagar for over two years. Officials said on Monday that the probe into the case of two children, a 15-year-old girl and a 13-year-old girl, led them to Srinagar, where the girls were rescued in June. Both girls were neighbours and went missing from Bhalswa Dairy in 2024.
“One of the girls managed to contact a person she knew, who further informed the police,” said the concerned official to the national media.
According to the statement of the two children to the Child Welfare Committee, they were taken from Old Delhi Railway Station and forced as domestic help without pay. The accused in the matter was identified as Salim Ul Rahman alias Waseem, a 38-year-old resident of Ganderbal in Srinagar. The other two accused in the case are Mohammad Talib, resident of Begur in Delhi and originally from Rampur in Uttar Pradesh, and Satnam Singh, alias Sardar Ji, of Barabanki in Uttar Pradesh. The Delhi Police arrested Suraj from Delhi on 14th August and arrested Rahman from Srinagar.
Investigation Reveals
“Salim operated a placement agency in Meena under the name VA Manpower Private Limited, through which nearly 500 people have been trafficked in two years,” said DCP (Outer North) Harsh Vara Swamy. The officer further added that each victim was sold for ₹20,000 to ₹25,000 if male and ₹40,000 to ₹60,000 if female.
According to the police, the network of touts and placement agents targeted vulnerable minors and labourers at railway stations. Under fake identities, the trafficked individuals were moved across states and payments were routed through UPI and hawala channels. Suraj, one of the accused in the matter, also informed the police that he ferried trafficked persons from railway stations in Delhi on the instruction of agents. From Talib, police recovered a forged UP Police identity card, which he allegedly used to evade checks while transporting the trafficked children.
For their investigation, the police will try to probe into the financial trails, vehicles used for transport, and documents that enabled the trafficking network to function. The probe till now has also revealed a lot about the other accused in the matter, namely Shahbaz Khan, Naresh, Rohit Pandey, and Sohail Ahmed of Sunaaz Placement Agency in Srinagar. All this together is part of a syndicate, and more arrests are likely to be made in the near future.