24 minor circus girls rescued from circus

AKOLA: Around 24 minor girls working in a circus company were rescued from here by the labour department and the local police.
    
Acting on a complaint filed by an Nepal-based NGO, police raided the Kanpur-based Rajkamal circus company and rescued the girls mostly hailing from Nepal and Assam, police said.
    
The Nepal-based NGO Esther Benjamin's Trust in its complaint to the Nepal Embassy, had said that "all the rescued under-aged girls, were employed by the circus company as 'trainees'.
    
Philip Holmes, founder of the Trust said "in Nepal there is no law to stop child labour due to which lot of explitation takes place in Nepal."
    
Defending the company's agreement with the staff members, the owner of the circus Fateh Khan said, the girls are taken care with food, clothing, shelter and medical care and also are paid a stipend of Rs 100 per month.
    
Interstingly, in the name of probation the owner had paid Rs 1,000 to the parents of the girls and if the girls want to return back to her parents, then the parents have to pay to the owner.
    
All the girls have been shifted to a city-based remand home, police said.