Goa police today busted an inter-state sex racket after tip-off from Manipur police and rescued 11 girls from a beauty-cum-massage parlour at Candolim. The Women and Child Protection team also arrested five boys employed at the parlour and is most likely to arrest the owner Mahalaxmi Mishra.
The raid was carried out in view of a letter written by Manipur Superintendent of Police to Goa Police that Manipur girls were trafficked in Goa and are working at the parlour.
“The Manipur police had written to Goa police that girls working at the parlor (name formally not disclosed) were trafficked from the former state. The intimation was in wake of several cases wherein north eastern women and girls are trafficked in Goa,” Margao-based women NGO Bailancho Ekvott chief Auda Veigas told the waiting journalists late night.
Veigas was called to assist the police team during and after carrying out the raid. She further told reporters that the Manipur Government also expressed concern that girls though are not professional beauticians have been employed at such parlours.
“They found it suspicious and therefore asked Goa police to carry out a raid,” she further said.
A high-voltage scene unfolded inside women’s police station at Panjim when Mishra was locked inside the police station with the arrested boys and rescued victims. She kept on banging the door from inside and screaming that ‘I have not done anything wrong. I will not keep quite.’
Media persons were forced outside the police station as the police closed all the doors creating a panicky situation for nearly two hours.
It may be recalled that Mishra had launched a sustained campaign after series of raids in her parlour led by Calangute police inspector Nolasco Raposo. The owner had also approached Goa State Commission for Women (GSCW) in July that police were harassing her.
Calangute police had rescued 29 girls in a raid along the Calangute-Baga belt in July, five of whom were working in the ‘Shamile beauty lounge’ at Candolim.
Owner of the said beauty parlour Mishra had filed a formal complaint with the GSCW that her female employees were picked up from their accommodation without explaining the offense.
[Source]
