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Two sisters flee debt bondage near Peshawar
[The News (Pak)] Two minor sisters, who were working as bonded labourers, managed to escape from the house of their landlord in Hayatabad, where they were being kept for the past seven months against a debt of Rs12,000.Sana, 12, and Asma, 8, escaped from the Hayatabad residence of Habibullah, a resident of Mardan. After crossing into the nearby Khyber Agency, the girls started running towards the mountains. The local Khassadars, on seeing them running in scare, took them in their protection and brought them to the office of the assistant political agent. The two girls, who were constantly weeping, were not going to disclose as to why they were running. Later, they SAID they were sisters working at the house of Habibullah. The girls SAID their father had borrowed Rs12,000 from Habibullah but could not return on time. As a voluntary arrangement some seven months ago, they said, their father agreed with Habibullah to pay off the loan in the form of direct labour by his daughters instead of currency. They said they had been working since then as housemaids with the family of Habibullah. They said after getting fed up with the torture by the family, they fled the house. Posted by: Fred 2009-05-07 |
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