Awake at four A.M., hours of training, regular beatings, and at least two performances a day, seven days a week - life in most of India’s circuses is no fairy tale. For the thousands of children who work for little or no pay, it’s practically a life of slavery.

Deepa, now 20 years old, spent five years in a circus in southern India. “Early in the morning the trainer used to teach us how to walk the tightrope, ride the unicycle, and jump from moving vehicles. If relatives from home came to visit, they weren’t allowed to see us. They would not even allow us to send letters; if they found us trying to send them they would beat us.”

Child trafficking

Deepa is from Nepal. She ended up in the circus after a couple of men came to her village and convinced her that there was no future for her in Nepal. “[They] said ‘It’s pointless for you girls to stay at home, come with us to India where you can earn a lot of money.’” Despite her mother’s protests, she went with the men, along with her older sister and eight other girls from her village.

Thousands of Nepali children have been trafficked or sold by their parents into unknown futures in India. Nepali children are particularly valuable to India’s circus and brothel owners, because they look so enticingly foreign to for Indian customers. “That was a star attraction in circuses,” says Philip Holmes, “scantily clad little Nepali girls, light skinned, exotic features...”

Rescue

Holmes started an organisation called the Esther Benjamins Trust. Through it, he works to rescue Nepali children who have been trafficked to India. Since the trust was founded in 2002, they’ve saved more than 300 children from Indian circuses. 

The trust team raids circuses where children are working, after lining up paperwork and cooperation from Nepali and Indian authorities. “When you enter the circus, you conduct a search as well,” Holmes says. “You're looking in boxes to see if there are any little girls being hidden away. [On a raid] you see that these kids are prisoners to these pretty horrible people.”

After five years in the circus, Deepa managed to send a letter to her father. He contacted the trust and accompanied them on a raid to the circus where his daughters were working. A few weeks later, Deepa and her sister were back home. 

Holmes says not all of the children they bring back to Nepal have a home to which they can return. “Our first priority is always to get the children back to their families. But it’s often the case that these families are dysfunctional; if you put children back into that environment, they are going to get re-trafficked. Those children come and stay at our refuge in Kathmandu.”

Now illegal

The trust did a survey of 30 circuses in 2002, they found that there were 232 Nepali children under the age of 13 working in India’s circuses. Holmes says he doesn’t know what the current number is.

This spring the Indian Supreme Court banned all child labour in circuses but it’s hard to implement or police.  When the trust raided a circus earlier this month, Holmes says they found eight children still working there. “The law alone won’t be enough,” he says. “We're working to support child-free circuses, and to arrest the people who traffic in young children.”

For as long as children are still in the circus, it is the most vulnerable who are paying the heaviest price for a cheap public entertainment.

You can hear an audio version of this story on South Asia Wired's latest radio program.