India fourth most dangerous place for women: survey

The high number of female
foeticide, infanticide and human trafficking
prevalent in India has placed it as the fourth
most dangerous place for women in the
world, according to a survey.
Afghanistan is the most dangerous place for
women followed by Democratic Republic of
Congo, Pakistan, India and Somalia in the
survey conducted by Thomson Reuters'
Trustlaw Women, a hub of legal information
and legal support for women's rights.
Three of these countries are in South Asia.
The poll asked 213 experts in the field from
five continents to rank countries on their
overall perception of danger as well as by
six key categories of risk, health threats,
sexual violence, non-sexual violence, harmful
practices rooted in culture, tradition and/or
religion, lack of access to economic
resources and human trafficking.
"India ranked fourth primarily due to female
foeticide, infanticide and human trafficking,"
the poll said.
In 2009, India's Home Secretary Madhukar
Gupta had remarked that at least 100 million
people were involved in human trafficking
in India, according to the survey.
The CBI has estimated that in 2009 about 90
per cent of trafficking took place within the
country and that there were three million
prostitutes, of which 40 per cent were
children.
Other forms of exploitation include forced
labour and forced marriage.
"In India, upto 50 million girls were thought
to be 'missing' over the past century due to
female infanticide and foeticide," as per the
UN Population Fund.