In this Migration Series Seminar, Jaffer Latief Najar will discuss everyday struggles of migrant urban migrants who are seen as ‘victims of trafficking’ in India. He will consider how they perceive and experience the current anti-trafficking practices, looking into the harms that the current anti-trafficking system in India is introducing into their lives.
He looks specifically at the experiences of migrant sex workers and construction workers in India.
The presentation will highlight the role that agency, citizenship and ‘unfreedom’ plays in migrants’ experiences. These migrants are often seen as ‘victims of trafficking’ by anti-trafficking stakeholders, despite the fact that they do not see themselves in this light. This view by stakeholders causes harm to the migrants as it places them in a position of victimhood, hence denying them their agency.
The migrants use the concept of citizenship as a form of belonging to struggle against and deal with these harmful interventions by anti-trafficking stakeholders.
Background
The dominant global discourse of human trafficking has been largely sketched as a campaign against the exploitation of human being. However, the everyday realities of those who are framed as ‘trafficked victims’ indicates that the voices of these migrants are made invisible, ignored or silenced. Such silencing (re)produces the harms and sufferings in their lives.
India’s anti-trafficking system is not immune to such practices and (re)production of these harms. This presentation by Jaffer Latief Nafar is based on the biographic narratives, observations and experiences of migrant sex workers and migrant construction workers in India. He has engaged with these workers as part of his ongoing research in parts of Kolkata, particularly Sonagachi, Asia’s largest red-light district.
