Real-Life Mardaani: IPS Officer Mallika Banerjee’s Undercover Mission That Rescued Children And Crushed Trafficking Rings

In a country where crime often hides behind paperwork and polite façades, the most effective policing sometimes begins far away from uniforms, sirens and police stations. It begins in the dust of village

lanes, in whispered conversations, in the uncomfortable choice to blend in rather than stand apart. That was the road Mallika Banerjee chose in 2016, when she quietly stepped out of her official role and into the life of a door-to-door saleswoman in Chhattisgarh. There were no dramatic disguises or cinematic monologues, just persistence, patience and an instinct that something deeply wrong was happening to children who were vanishing under the guise of “jobs” in big cities. What followed was not a one-off success story but an early warning. Her mission revealed how trafficking networks are growing because of poverty. It presents exploitation as opportunity and violence as employment. Nearly a decade later, as fresh police crackdowns rescue thousands of children across India, her operation reads less like a closed chapter and more like a prologue to a crisis that refuses to disappear.

The undercover choice that changed everything

In 2016, posted in Chhattisgarh, Banerjee realised that conventional policing was failing to crack a disturbing pattern. Families spoke of sons and daughters leaving for work placements and never returning. Complaints were fragmentary, often withdrawn under pressure or fear. So she did something unusual: she went undercover. Disguised as a saleswoman, she traveled across villages, speaking to people, asking them questions she couldn't in uniform. Eventually, Banerjee understood a pattern and noticed similar names. Agencies sounded legitimate but operated in shadows. Job offers promised indepedence and income but ended in forced labour and abuse. Acting on this information, Banerjee and her team reopened cold cases and dismantled a network of around 25 illegal placement agencies. More than 20 children were rescued, pulled back from lives they had never chosen. There was no applause at the end of it, only paperwork, prosecutions and a sobering realisation of how easily trafficking can masquerade as opportunity.

When policing is quiet, not cinematic

Banerjee’s work has often been likened to a “real-life Mardaani”, but the truth is more unsettling than any film. There were no heroic confrontations, only methodical police work. And that, perhaps, is the most frightening part: how ordinary trafficking looks on the surface. Traffickers rarely arrive as villains. They come as recruiters, acquaintances, neighbours of neighbours. They understand that desperation is their strongest ally. Banerjee’s operation revealed that the most dangerous crimes often wear the most respectable masks.

From Chhattisgarh to the rest of India

What Banerjee uncovered in 2016 is now being echoed across the country. In Gujarat, a recent joint police operation dismantled an inter-state trafficking racket and rescued a newborn who was being transported to Hyderabad. Investigators traced a layered chain of middlemen buying and selling infants, exploiting gaps between state jurisdictions. In Jharkhand, police busted an inter-state gang accused of abducting children and moving them across Bihar, West Bengal, Odisha and Uttar Pradesh. Twelve children aged between four and twelve were rescued, and officials described the group as an “active inter-state child theft gang”. In Kolkata, police rescued a minor girl allegedly abducted by people posing as members of an “orchestra” troupe at cultural events. The tactic was chillingly simple: gain familiarity at community gatherings, earn trust, then disappear with a child. These cases underline a harsh truth. Trafficking networks do not rely on darkness alone; they operate in public spaces, festivals and job markets, hiding in plain sight.

The numbers behind the horror

The scale of the crisis is staggering. According to a report by the Centre for Legal Action and Behaviour Change (C-LAB), which analysed data from civil society organisations working with law enforcement, 53,651 children were rescued from child labour and trafficking between April 2024 and March 2025. Nearly 38,388 FIRs were registered across 24 states and union territories, leading to thousands of arrests. The report notes that a large proportion of rescues involved the worst forms of exploitation, including forced labour in spas, massage parlours, orchestra troupes and environments resembling brothels. These are spaces where beggar mafias, sex trafficking, and bonded labour often overlap. States such as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Telangana, Rajasthan, and Delhi are hotspots. They require targeted enforcement and long-term rehabilitation strategies rather than sporadic raids.

Delhi’s alarming rise in child labour rescues

Delhi’s data is particularly unsettling. Police records show a 51 per cent rise in child labour rescues in the first five months of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. In those months alone, 202 children were rescued and 22 alleged traffickers arrested. Most of these children had been brought from economically weaker states including Jharkhand, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. They were lured by promises of stable work, only to be trapped in exploitative conditions in the capital.

Institutions under pressure to act

At the national level, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights has reported rescuing over 2,300 children within six months through coordinated interventions, while launching a pan-India campaign focused on rescue, rehabilitation and systemic reform. State legislatures are also confronting grim statistics. In Odisha, the government cited data from the National Crime Records Bureau showing 1,305 people trafficked in the state, including 348 minors. Judicial scrutiny is intensifying. The Supreme Court of India has described child trafficking as “very rampant” in Delhi and sought detailed reports from the Centre, urging faster trials to prevent traffickers from exploiting judicial delays.

The human cost behind the headlines

Statistics capture scale, not suffering. Children rescued from trafficking often carry invisible scars: trauma, mistrust, interrupted education, and a lingering fear of authority. Rescue is just the first step. Counselling, rehabilitation, and reintegration into families and schools determine whether freedom truly lasts.