12 year old Aghan was
kidnapped by a carpet factory owner and kept in slavery for
three years in a village in Mirzapur (U.P) He was forced to
work 15-18 hours a day, 7 days a week, without any money. He
has never been allowed to go back home or to meet with his
parents who located him after tirless efforts. One day he
cried for his mother and was slow in his work, the master
mutilated his face and branded his right cheek with a
glowing iron rod. Aghan didnt stop crying so the angry
master squeezed the leaves of a poisonous plant (dhatura)
over his left eye and blinded him.
Source: Jai Singh
of Anti-Slavery International to the Un Commission on Human
Rights working group on Contemporary forms of Slavery,
Twenty-First Session- June 1996
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