Trafficker eludes cops, bhabhi held

Panna Lal Mahto’s residence in Delhi

A.S.R.P. MUKESH & SUMI SUKANYA, TT,New Delhi/Ranchi, Oct. 13: Trafficking kingpin Panna Lal Mahto has escaped from his national capital residence, but he could be hiding in Gumla now, his bhabhi and fellow trafficker Gayatri Devi, who was arrested in Delhi today, has revealed.

Thirty-five-year-old Gayatri, the wife of Panna Lal’s elder brother Ritubhanjan Sahu, who was arrested around 11am today from her East Delhi “placement agency” by a joint team of Khunti police and Delhi police (crime branch), told the police the whereabouts of Panna Lal.

Panna Lal and his wife Sunita, who had given shelter to absconding former agriculture minister Yogendra Sao in Delhi, had given them the slip, a policeman who was part of today’s raid, admitted.

“A woman named Hiramai was at Panna Lal’s house. She said she was his second wife. We are yet to ascertain if she has any trafficking links,” he said, but declined to add anything more about the woman.

However, Gayatri’s arrest has opened a line of inquiry.

Originally from Torpa in Khunti, her name figures among the 240 most wanted human traffickers of Jharkhand listed by the police. She runs Gayatri Enterprises in Delhi, a non-registered placement agency that allegedly supplies maidservants and sells girls into domestic and sexual slavery.

Earlier, Gayatri operated from Shakur Basti, near Panna Lal’s own placement agency. Police heat and ensuing publicity made her move to Pandav Nagar in East Delhi.

Wanted in many cases of trading minor tribal girls from Jharkhand, Panna Lal hogged headlines when CID (Jharkhand) and Delhi police arrested Sao from his home on October 4, but left him behind.

This police oversight earned widespread media ire as Panna Lal, allegedly running a multi-crore business model with scores of illegal placement agencies that dealt in supply of Jharkhand girls as domestic servants, into forced marriages and to brothels, had an arrest warrant and four FIRs against him.

As anger against Sao’s Delhi host mounted, state police sent a five-member team headed by Khunti anti-human trafficking unit in-charge Aradhana Singh to Delhi last week.

Singh remained tight-lipped about today’s operation. But, a source from Delhi NGO Shakti Vahini, which is co-ordinating with the police, confirmed Gayatri’s arrest and added that efforts were on to nab Panna Lal in Jharkhand.

Baidyanath Kumar, an official of Khunti-based NGO Diya Seva Sansthan, who claimed to have alerted the raid team about Gayatri’s whereabouts, was forthcoming.

“Last night, posing as a client, I called up Gayatri. She told me they had temporarily shut their Shakur Basti agency but opened office in Pandav Nagar in East Delhi. We told the Khunti police in Delhi. Police personnel got in touch with her and her agents, posing as customers and referred to last night’s discussion. They caught her from Pandav Nagar,” Kumar said.

Gayatri’s agency had been raided by Delhi CID in 2012 from where several girls were rescued.