Regulate placement agencies: Delhi High Court

New Delhi, March 26 The Delhi High Court Wednesday asked the state government to make laws to regulate the mushrooming placement agencies in the national capital.

Expressing a urgent need of having laws and guidelines, a division bench headed by Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah and Justice Sanjeev Khanna asked the government to frame a draft and submit it to the court.

The court was hearing a petition filed by an NGO Shramjivi Mahila Samiti. The petition alleged that minor girls from West Bengal, employed as maids, were badly treated and even sexually harassed by the placement agency owners.

'There is no law in Delhi to regulate the functioning of placement agencies,' Mukta Gupta said in the court.

The court refuted the government's stand that it was asking the placement agencies to register themselves under the Shops and Establishment Act.

'This is not going to solve any purpose as it will only tell the number of agencies in the capital. Our concern is to regularise these so that no illegal activities take place,' the court said.