It’s the most popular beverage in the world but the industry behind it bears a dark secret. This week, the CNN Freedom Project takes a closer look at India’s tea industry. Deep in the Himalayan mountains, CNN found tea workers living in squalor in crumbling mud huts, many with no access to education, and too poor to risk moving away. The results are often horrific – workers are struggling to survive, while others have been trafficked into the sex trade.
This special three part series includes:
- TRAFFICKED FOR TEA
The CNN Freedom Project treks to Assam, India, a region that produces more tea than anywhere in the world to meet 18-year old Manju Gaur. She was just 14 when the traffickers came, promising a better life in the big city. With no education and making just pennies a day, she thought it would be a way to support her family. Instead, she saw young girls sexually assaulted by a ruthless trafficker, their money confiscated, and unable to leave. Manju managed to escape but now she has another concern. Her 14-year old sister was still being held by traffickers.
- THE RAID
In a daring raid on an apartment complex, the CNN Freedom Project embeds with local police on a mission to rescue Manju’s 14-year old sister being held for more than a year by an alleged trafficker. CNN confronts the alleged trafficker, a man with a history. As police apprehend him, they demand to know where Manju’s 14-year old sister has been working. Will there be a final, emotional reunion?
- MEET THE TRAFFICKERS
Why do they do it and what makes tea workers such easy prey for trafficking? The CNN Freedom Project meets a convicted trafficker, who confesses to selling girls for as little as $200. He takes CNN to the railway station to show where he loaded girls on to the train and shipped them off to a life of domestic servitude – and sometimes, worse.
Airtimes:
Week of March 14, 2016, during CNN’s News Stream from 530pm IST.
Related links:
http://edition.cnn.com/specials/world/freedom-project
