NUWAKAT DISTRICT, NEPAL — Tamang’s parents tried for years to harvest vegetables on dry, barren land. They tended a small herd of cattle and plowed their neighbors’ fields when times were particularly hard.
Watching his parents struggle, Tamang dreamed of a different future. She wanted to become a nurse and ease the burden on her parents. By the time she was in sixth grade, she was walking a two-hour round trip to school every day to try to make this dream come true.
Then, when she was just 13, what she thought was hope appeared. Someone on Facebook told her she could get a job if she left home with him. Her parents agreed that she could go.
The Facebook man never told her what kind of job she would have. But once she traveled deeper into India, to a town called Shantipur, she discovered: she was to become a sex worker, serving more than a dozen clients every day.
She decided that this was her destiny – the only way, she believed, to lift her family out of their dire poverty. (The Global Press Journal only publishes Tamang’s last name due to the stigma associated with her experience.)
As access to social media has grown in rural Asia, human trafficking has also grown, according to data from think tanks, law enforcement and nonprofit organizations trying to stem the flow of people, often young children, into the hands of criminals who abuse them.
Nepal has been slow to adopt social media. In the early 2010s, less than 10% of the country’s population had access to the Internet. But at the start of 2025, 55% of the population had some form of connectivity. There are about 39 million cell phone connections, or about 132% of the total population, including many people with more than one cell phone.
This meant traffickers could expand their efforts to remote villages, where extreme poverty is common. Combined with low levels of education, girls in these regions are at high risk of being lured into sexual slavery. They are targeted through lengthy online grooming conversations before being lured to India.
About 41 percent of trafficked women say they were promised marriage during the preparation process, which young women and girls view as an opportunity for financial security and higher social status.
Taylor Robb-McCord, a spokesperson for Meta, which owns Facebook, says “human exploitation is abhorrent and is not allowed on our platforms,” adding that Meta prohibits and removes content that enables human exploitation, including trafficking and contraband. Meta’s policies are created in collaboration with organizations, including the United Nations, that have expertise in issues related to human trafficking.
“Combating human exploitation is everyone’s responsibility, and because we serve billions of people from different cultures and perspectives, we prioritize reducing harm on our platforms,” says Robb-McCord.
Traffic hotspot
During the coronavirus lockdown, cases of trafficking on social media increased as criminals took advantage of the anxiety and economic hardship caused by the closure of schools and workplaces, says Narendra Kunwar, spokesperson for the government’s Anti-Human Trafficking Office.
In 2022, South and Central Asia reported the world’s highest incidence of trafficking in women and children, with nearly 50 million people trafficked to and from the region, according to the report “Human trafficking in Asia: a hidden scourge” from think tank GROW.
In its 2024 “Trafficking in Persons” report, the United States Department of State found that India and Nepal are major destinations for people forced into sex work, who often come from South Asian countries, including Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Pakistan. According to the report, around 1.5 million Nepalis are at risk of being trafficked.
Poverty pushes many Nepali women into the hands of traffickers who exploit their hopes for a better life, says Charimaya Tamang, who heads the Shakti Group, a Nepalese nonprofit run by trafficked people. Charimaya Tamang (who is not related to Tamang, the girl featured in this article) was rescued in 1996, along with 500 other Nepalese, Indian and Bangladeshi women, freed by the Indian government during a raid on Mumbai brothels.
“In the past, brokers would go door to door to lure women into prostitution and sell them to brothels in India,” explains Charimaya Tamang. “But today they have weaponized the internet, using social media platforms to identify and lure women and girls, then cater them to apartments across India. »
Bishwo Ram Khadka, executive director of Maiti Nepal, a nonprofit that helps exploited women and children, says traffickers lure girls online with promises of employment or marriage, then take advantage of Nepal’s open border with India to move them quickly.
Tamang’s older sister, who disappeared more than two years ago, was also allegedly sold into sex slavery in India, Khadka says. Efforts are underway to find and rescue her.
The promises that traffickers make to young girls online are so enticing that Tamang fell into the same trap.
“Why are you doing this?”
Tamang, who the Global Press Journal interviewed at a shelter for former sex workers, was recruited through Facebook by a man who promised she would earn money if she traveled with him. Together, they crossed the open border between Nepal and India by minibus, then by rickshaw and train to reach the town of Sonagachi, known for its huge red light district. From there, it took another hour to reach Shantipur, a city of about a quarter of a million people. Tamang says she was captivated by the tall buildings and busy streets.
But once she was introduced to her male employer, she says the man she was traveling with left and never returned. She says she keeps looking for him on Facebook but can’t find him.
Tamang says she rested for two days in her Shantipur apartment and then was forced to start working. Her employer registered her on an Aadhaar card, the identity card issued by the Indian government, at the age of 22, nine years older than her.
In the past, brothel owners used printed photo albums to feature women and girls, says Ramsharan Poudel, deputy director of Aafanta Nepal, a nonprofit organization fighting human trafficking in Nepal.
Social media has also accelerated this aspect of the problem. Tamang’s employer posted photos of Tamang and other girls on WhatsApp so customers could choose them.
Tamang says she made 500 Indian rupees (about $5.70) per customer. Of this sum, she says, she gave 150 Indian rupees (US$1.71) to her employer. A man followed the arrival and departure of each of his customers; he was forbidden from spending more than 20 minutes with each person.
Police and soldiers came as customers, she said, and asked her what she was doing there.
“Why are you doing this at such a young age?” » they asked. “Go home.”
Growing up, Tamang saw her aunts and sisters returning from India wearing beautiful clothes and gold jewelry. She wanted the same thing, but she didn’t know then that these aunts and sisters were also victims of trafficking. For them, the urge to earn money was so strong that they returned to brothels in India, even after coming home.
Tamang also bought herself some nice clothes. But these shopping breaks were short; she said she served customers from 11 a.m. to 3 a.m. every day.
A complex and monumental problem
Prosecuting human traffickers is an exceptionally difficult challenge due to the cross-border nature of the problem, says Kunwar of the Office to Combat Human Trafficking. Once people settle in India, he says, it falls outside the jurisdiction of the Nepal police.
“Carrying out investigations is much more complex,” he says.
The bureau reported that 434 women and girls have been forced into sex or other labor in India since 2019. During this period, Nepalese law enforcement arrested 530 of 944 people accused of trafficking-related crimes. Most were later convicted and served time in prison. The maximum sentence is 20 years.
It’s a drop in the bucket. According to Nepal Police data, 36,912 children went missing between 2013 and 2024 (11,299 boys and 25,613 girls, all under the age of 18). Most of the girls are believed to have been trafficked to India.
The onus is on the accuser to present proof that they were trafficked, says Shakti’s Charimaya Tamang. They are asked to provide detailed stories, but their memories may be fuzzy due to psychological distress, she says.
The Nepalese government is aligning its laws with international protocols, including ratifying the Palermo Protocol in June 2020, which provides a universally recognized definition of trafficking and calls for massive support for those who exit it.
But Nepal has not adopted specific legislation to meet international protocols, says Rabindra Sapkota of Aafanta Nepal. Sometimes women and girls forced into the sex trade refuse to testify against the attackers, for fear of reprisals or because they are paid to remain silent.
A new life
When it became clear that Tamang was likely being trafficked, Maiti Nepal added his name to a list of children who needed to be rescued. Through its investigative efforts in India’s red light districts, the agency identified the apartment where she and other girls were being held. In February 2024, Maiti Nepal, with the help of Indian police, the Nepalese consulate and child rescue organizations, searched the apartment. They found nine girls, including Tamang, hiding under a bed. All the girls had Aadhaar cards which claimed they were adults and had come to the brothel voluntarily.
When the police released the girls, they returned to the brothel. A person from Maiti Nepal went to Tamang village and obtained her birth certificate and school documents, which proved to the Indian police that she was 15 years old then. They returned to the apartment, but discovered that Tamang had been transferred elsewhere.
Earlier this year, Maiti Nepal located Tamang again, this time in an apartment in Calcutta. By the time the team arrived, many of the girls had fled. Tamang hid behind a door and the police found her.
They took her to a child protection home in India, then handed her over to Maiti Nepal, which brought her to Kathmandu.
Tamang wants to return to his village, walk the paths that were familiar to him in his childhood, sit in a classroom where dreams are born, share laughter with friends under the open sky.