The moment Hema Salaat (first name changed to protect identity), 13, stepped into the car, she knew her life had changed forever. Over the next 48 hours, she was raped and physically assaulted by Ashok Patel, whom she still calls bhai. His wife, Renuka, stood by, encouraging her husband to torture her into submission. Hema was about to be sold into what is a combination of slavery and rape, to a man many decades her senior.
In what was a departure from the norm, the Gujarat police immediately investigated a missing complaint filed by her parents, and she was rescued. Officers usually don’t snap into action, assuming that teens elope out of choice. In Hema’s case, what caught their attention was the presence of a woman. Their action also led to the freeing of Priya Patni (first name changed), 14, another child-bride victim who had been kidnapped 11 months earlier. She had been sold for ₹3 lakh, while a go-between got ₹5,000.
The police have tracked down six of the alleged perpetrators, but Hema and Priya are likely one of many teens from impoverished, so-called low-caste, marginalised families, who are physically tortured and mentally broken by the cruel commerce of underage bride trafficking.
