Arun Pandey

Pandey is a law graduate and holds a postgraduate qualification in criminology and correctional administration from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

Before founding ARZ, Pandey worked as a senior researcher at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, where between 1994 and 1997 he took part in a national study on human trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation.

He was one of the founder members of ARZ in 1998 and serves as its director. His work covers prevention, rescue and rehabilitation of victims of child sexual abuse and commercial sexual exploitation, and he runs training programmes for judicial officers, civil servants, police and service providers. He has written research articles, books and standard operating procedures on trafficking and crime prevention. ARZ has argued that reducing trafficking in Goa depends on preventing the entry of new women into the sex trade, prosecuting traffickers and providing alternative livelihoods; the organisation runs an economic rehabilitation unit called Swift Wash for survivors.

Pandey has continued to comment publicly on changing patterns of trafficking in Goa, including a rise in victims being brought into the state by air, and has taken part in training programmes for security personnel at Dabolim airport.

Pandey received the ICSDAP Presidential Award in 2021. ARZ was named best non-governmental organisation by India's Ministry of Home Affairs in 2011, and its Swift Wash rehabilitation unit received a Nari Shakti Award from the Ministry of Women and Child Development in 2014.[2][3][4][5]