"Kept Chained, Given No Toilet Breaks": Bonded Labourers Rescued In Maharashtra

Forced to dig wells all day without even a washroom break and their legs kept chained all night so they wouldn't run away - this was the horrific treatment meted out to 11 men in Maharashtra, who were lured away from their villages with the promise of food and paid labour and then made to work as bonded labourers. 

Far from being paid the wages they were owed, the contractor in Maharashtra's Osmanabad even took away their meagre belongings, including their phones and Aadhaar cards.

The labourers, who belong to poor families and hail from Maharashtra's Hingoli, Nanded and Buldhana districts and parts of Madhya Pradesh, said they were lured by the contractor to work in Osmanabad with the promise of work, food and liquor. News agency PTI reported that the labourers were rescued on June 17 after another worker managed to escape. He reached his village in Hingoli district and informed the police.

The wounds on his legs from being chained still festering, one of the rescued labourers, Amol Nimbalkar, said, "At 6 am every day, I was kicked awake and allowed to go to the toilet. Without even being given tea or time to wash my face, I would be taken straight to work in the well. Food was given at 10 am, but I would be given hardly five minutes before being asked to work again."

Mr Nimbalkar said they weren't even allowed toilet breaks. "They asked us to do whatever they wanted, no matter what the situation. These were the kind of atrocities that were committed against us. They didn't even pay me my wages. I worked for 15 days and they took away my phone and Aadhaar card. I have got those back, but not my money," he said. 

Jagdish Raut, Assistant Police Inspector, Toki Police Station, said, "We formed a team and when we reached the place, we found five men working in a well. They told us that they were being forced to work and kept chained at night."

"They informed us that some more men were being made to work somewhere else. When we got there, we found six men working in another well. All of them were rescued and brought to the police station," he added.

A police official said a case has been registered and four people have been arrested. 

The National Human Rights Commission had also sent notices to the Maharashtra government and the state's police chief, the PTI report said. The panel had said that the provisions of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act had been "grossly violated" by the contractor. 

It had also pointed to the "failure of the local administration to safeguard the labourers from such brutality committed upon them by the contractors, without any fear of the law".