The international girl child day: Rubina

On International Girl Child Day, we want to focus on the challenges faced by girls in the communities we work with. These challenges are many and have different faces, but they all have a common denominator: poverty and vulnerability to human trafficking.

This is Rubina’s story. This 16-year-old girl is a very good science student, who also excels in arts and crafts. She is intelligent, funny, very humble, despite how much she shines. She is very well organized and has a clear idea: to have a great professional future to be able to help her family, her mother and her brother.

Up to this point, beyond the young woman’s abilities, it might seem that her life is developing normally. She lives with her mother, who makes handmade postcards and with her brother who also studies. This is where everything goes wrong: the three of them have been living on the streets for ten years. Despite working and despite studying, this is where they ended up when they had to flee from a father and husband with alcoholism problems who mistreated them.

Rubina has vision problems and this is where her life collided with Mumbai Smiles, who are supporting her so that she has access to a healthcare system and her medications.

However, this is not the biggest problem she faces, despite her life is difficult. The biggest problem is to avoid falling into the hands of human trafficking mafias, since she and her family are an easy target. Now, thanks to having participated in the information sessions that we organize in the schools and with the families we work with, they have more information to avoid it.

At Mumbai Smiles we will continue to stand by her and all the other girls to prevent new cases and rescue those who are already victims of trafficking, with an objective that they become survivors in a future.

One in three victims of trafficking are boys and girls.

Collaborate: #breakwithtrafficking