Young girls are pushed into illegal child marriages so they can work alongside their husbands cutting and gathering sugar cane. Labor brokers loan money for the surgeries, even to resolve ailments as routine as heavy, painful periods. Hysterectomies keep them working, undistracted by doctor visits or the hardship of menstruating in a field with no access to running water, toilets or shelter. But for many sugar laborers, the operation has a particularly grim outcome: Borrowing against future wages plunges them further into debt, ensuring that they return to the fields next season and beyond. Workers’ rights groups and the United Nations labor agency have defined such arrangements as forced labor.

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Persons: Young, Hysterectomies Organizations: New York Times, Fuller, Labor, Workers, United Nations Locations: Maharashtra