Supreme Court Frames Victim Protection Plan for Human Trafficking Survivors

The Supreme Court has framed a Victim Protection Plan for survivors of trafficking meant for commercial and sexual exploitation. A two-judge bench observed that the absence of a dedicated law to protect and rehabilitate such victims left a gap that seriously harmed their fundamental rights. The court said it had no choice but to issue detailed directions, and these directions will stay in force until Parliament passes a proper law on the subject.

The bench stressed that the plan must place the victim at the centre and treat survivors not as passive sufferers but as people who need support to rebuild their lives. It noted that every person has dignity simply because they are human, and that trafficking attacks this dignity directly by treating people as objects to be bought and sold. The court also pointed out that poverty and lack of an independent livelihood make people easy targets, and that such deprivation can strip away a person's dignity entirely.

The case has a long history. It began with a 2004 petition by a Hyderabad-based anti-trafficking organisation, which argued that survivors of sexual exploitation were often treated as criminals rather than as victims, and that the lack of a comprehensive protection plan made rescue and rehabilitation efforts weak. In December 2015, the court closed the petition after the government said it would set up an Organised Crime Investigation Agency and an inter-ministerial committee to draft an anti-trafficking law.

Those promises were not kept. Draft Bills were prepared in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2021, but none became law. A 2018 Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha but lapsed when the 16th Lok Sabha was dissolved. The plan for a new investigation agency was dropped, and in 2019 the National Investigation Agency was instead given powers to investigate trafficking offences. The petitioner organisation returned to the court in 2022, saying the earlier commitments had not been met.

On rehabilitation, the court held that survivors of trafficking for sexual exploitation have a constitutional right to be rehabilitated, flowing from Article 21 (right to life with dignity) and Article 23 (which prohibits trafficking in human beings and forced labour). Drawing on earlier rulings on bonded labour, the bench said there was no reason in law to give rehabilitation rights to freed bonded labourers but deny them to trafficking survivors, since both are victims of exploitative structures protected by Article 23.