The view from a red-light district in India, where some three million sex workers are caught in the middle of a debate on legalisation. Credit: bengarrison/CC-BY-SA-2.0

By Neeta Lal
NEW DELHI, Jan 16 2015 (IPS)

Thirty-six-year-old Chameli Devi, a sex worker operating out of New Delhi’s G.B. Road – Asia’s largest red-light district, housing an estimated 12,000 of India’s three million sex workers – is an unhappy woman these days.

A contentious debate over the sex trade in India, following a call for legalisation by the National Commission for Women (NCW) – a state-run body that advises the government on women-related policy matters – has Devi worried.

“In wealthier countries, many women genuinely choose this trade due to better income prospects and opportunities. But in India, every woman who enters this trade has invariably been coerced into it by a trafficker, her family or her husband." -- Sarita, a 43-year-old sex worker in New Delhi
She feels that merely issuing licences or permits to people of her ilk will not lead to the improvement of the unhealthy and, at times, dangerous conditions under which commercialised prostitution functions.

According to U.N. reports, about 70 percent of sex workers in India are abused by their clients and the police. Abuse, say activists, is often under-reported by sex workers due to a lack of knowledge of their basic rights.

“Most of us don’t take to the flesh trade out of choice but are sold by criminal mafias to brothels. The move to regulate our business will only end up giving immunity to the pimps and brothels to buy or sell poor women like us while increasing trafficking of young women and children,” Devi told IPS.

A recent study conducted by the Indian philanthropic non-profit Dasra found that roughly half of trafficking victims are adolescent girls, while the average age of sex workers has dropped from 14-16, to 10-14, “because young girls are believed to have a lower risk of carrying a sexually transmitted disease”.

“Most victims come from rural areas, over 70 percent are illiterate, and almost half reported that their families earned just about one dollar [per day],” the report stated.

Other studies have found that most sex workers in India are form the lower castes, communities that are routinely subjected to violence and exploitation in a highly stratified society.

It is unsurprising, then, that scores of women trapped in the trade remain highly opposed to legalization.

Sarita, 43, another sex worker, feels that while there may be a sound argument for legalisation in richer countries like the USA, or even China, such a system is ill-suited to India.

“In wealthier countries, many women genuinely choose this trade due to better income prospects and opportunities. But in India, every woman who enters this trade has invariably been coerced into it by a trafficker, her family or her husband,” she asserted. “So the dynamics of our society are very different.”

Curbing the flourishing sex trade

A 2014 study, ‘Economics Behind Forced Labour Trafficking’, spearheaded by Indian Nobel Peace Prize-winner Kailash Satyarthi, contains some of the most up-to-date data on the flourishing sex trade.

“The figures are shocking…In India alone, the money generated through [the] sex trade so far stands at a whopping 343 billion dollars. Research confirms that several agencies such as traffickers, brothel owners, money lenders, law enforcement officials, lawyers, judiciary and to a certain level even the victims of CSE (commercial sexual exploitation) eventually receive money for participation,” Satyarthi said in the study.

According to a 2009 United Nations report, sex trafficking is the commonest form of human trafficking in the world, making it the largest slave trade; about 79 percent of all human trafficking is for sex work and it is the fastest growing criminal industry globally.

Countries that have legalised prostitution are not much better off. The Netherlands, which legalised prostitution in 2000, continues to grapple with human traffickers smuggling women into the country’s brothels, point out non-profits working in the area.

With the legalisation debate gaining traction, public opinion in India is also splintered over the issue. Those who favour the move feel that it will whittle down harassment, legal intimidation, entrapment and exploitation of sex workers.

NCW Chairperson Lalitha Kumaramangalam, who set the ball rolling with her suggestion that the trade be brought under state control last month, feels that such a step will ensure better living conditions for women engaged in commercial sex work.

She contends it will reducing trafficking of both girls and women and improve the health conditions of sex workers who are presently forced to serve clients in unhygienic conditions and without condoms, which has caused HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases to spread.

In fact health care experts extend some of the strongest arguments in favour of legalising prostitution, or regulating it. They feel that the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, can be checked by bringing the business under the state umbrella as this will help health workers to better educate those in the trade about condom usage and basic hygiene.

Safer sex work or a massive bureaucracy?

Opponents of legalisation, however, are wary of the consequences of adding layers of regulation to India’s massive bureaucracy. They fear that government intervention could trigger harassment of the very people it seeks to protect.

“Legalising prostitution is legalising the profiteers of the sex-industry and their customers,” Ranjana Kumari, director for the New Delhi-based think tank Centre for Social Research, told IPS.

“It means rape of poor, lower-caste women with impunity. Not only that, it will make India a world magnet for sex trafficking and sex tourism.”

Donna M. Hughes, professor of Women’s Studies at the University of Rhode Island, writes in her essay ‘Prostitution: Causes and Solutions’ that legalisation does not reduce prostitution or trafficking.

“In fact,” she writes, “both activities increase because men can legally buy sex acts, and pimps and brothel keepers can legally sell and profit from them … In the Netherlands, since legalisation, there has been an increase in the use of children in prostitution.”

Activists working with sex workers are also deeply divided over the issue. While Dr S. Jana, who launched the 65,000-strong sex workers’ forum — Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee — based out of the eastern Indian state of West Bengal, has supported the legalisation call, others fear that it will further embolden traffickers and the prostitution mafia.

“Indian law and government policies have failed to protect sex workers due to the loopholes in law which makes them vulnerable to abuse. If the trade is legalised, the situation will worsen,” Meena Seshu, a feminist activist and founder of SANGRAM, a voluntary organisation working in the field of HIV control based in Sangli, a city in the western state of Maharashtra, told IPS.

Legalisation, adds the activist, could also scupper attempts by many women’s organisations and NGOs to rehabilitate women and children forced into prostitution.

“The state should formulate policies and schemes for the rehabilitation of sex workers who are coming out of this commercial sexual exploitation. This will offer a better solution to this complex problem,” Seshu contends.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Celebrations outside the house of Indian politician Mamata Banerjee. Credit: Avishek Mitra/IPS

By Neeta Lal
NEW DELHI, Jun 29 2014 (IPS)

National outrage over women’s security in India – or the lack of it – is nothing new. From the gang rape of a young girl on a Delhi bus two years ago, to the recent rapes and lynching of two teenage cousins in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, gender-based violence has claimed headlines.

But as the country emerges from the fanfare of national elections with a new prime minister – Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – the debate that is currently roiling the country is whether such tragedies – and apathy within the political class – would continue were there more women representatives in parliament?

Articulating a list of government priorities earlier this month, President Pranab Mukherjee included a strong commitment to ensuring 33 percent representation of women in the parliament, as well as state assemblies.

Passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill – which proposes to reserve a third of the seats in the Lok Sabha (lower house) and in all legislative assemblies for women – could be instrumental in sending out a powerful message of women’s empowerment, say experts here.

“There needs to be a critical mass of women out there to put women’s issues on the political agenda." -- Pratibha Pande, former professor at the Delhi University
The proposed Bill – cleared by the upper house (Rajya Sabha) in 2010 and now awaiting only a nod from the Lok Sabha, as well as the newly elected Modi – symbolises a crucial first step towards necessary electoral and parliamentary reforms.

The principle of gender equality is enshrined in the Indian constitution, and the country has also ratified various international conventions and human rights instruments to secure the equal rights of women; key among them is the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), ratified in 1993.

Despite these promises on paper, actual representation in what is dubbed ‘the world’s largest democracy’ remains low: currently, there are only 61 women out of a total of 543 MPs that make up the lower house of parliament.

Even though women form close to half of the population of 1.2 billion, they are underrepresented in all political positions. This was reflected in the recent elections, during which only 632 women ran for office, compared to 7,527 men.

“This is hardly proportional representation in the world’s largest democracy,” says Delhi-based sociologist Dr. Pratibha Pande, former professor at the Delhi University.

“However, if a third of the parliamentarians in India are women, a system of checks and balances will organically be kicked in to ensure enhanced vigilance from authorities in cases of rape and a skewed sex ratio, which is rampant across the country,” she asserted.

Indeed, the last few decades have seen a continuously declining female ratio in the population. Male children are still preferred, and though prenatal sex determination was banned in 1996, the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) estimates that 50 million women are “missing” in India as a result of female foeticide and infanticide.

Those girl children who survive this mindset tend to be given poorer care than boys.

The patriarchal attitude is so deeply entrenched across the country that, according to the 2011 census, India now has 37 million fewer women than men (586.5 million women to 623.7 million men).

The country’s literacy rate is also skewed in favour of men. Compared to a 76 percent literacy rate among men, only 54 percent of women can read or write, which further limits their opportunities to enter the political fray.

During the recent election campaign, many political parties – including the right-wing Hindu nationalist BJP, which succeeded in ending the Congress Party’s decade-long reign – expressed a desire to strengthen women-friendly laws and address the stubborn gender imbalance that pervades the country’s political arena.

However, neither party fielded more than a handful of women candidates, who were perceived by many as being mere ‘tokens’ in the process.

According to a recent paper by Carole Spary, a professor at the UK-based University of York, political parties in India tend to see women as less likely to win elections than men, and therefore prefer not to take risks with seats they could conceivably win.

This perceived ‘winnability’ factor based on gender is very strong across the country, experts say.

Amitabh Kumar of the Delhi-based Centre for Social Research, who has for years been spearheading a campaign for the passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill, told IPS that despite six decades of independence, a deeply misogynistic attitude scuppers women’s ability to enter politics and impact policy making.

“Even capable women who have demonstrated excellent administrative and leadership qualities find it tough to mobilise funds for contesting elections,” Kumar added.

In order to contest an MP’s seat today, a candidate requires at least five million dollars. “How many Indian women can muster such funds?” he asked.

Overall, women comprise just 11 percent of India’s lower house, a dismal figure when compared to many countries, including India’s South Asian neighbours.

According to data available for 2014 from the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), Pakistan has 67 women in a house of 323 (20.7 percent), Bangladesh has 67 members out of a total of 347 (19.3percent), while Nepal has a total of 172 women in a house of 575 (29.9 percent).

The Rajya Sabha does not fare much better, with 27 women members comprising 11.5 percent of the total membership in 2013, far below the world average of 19.6 percent.

Analysts say women’s representation in parliament is imperative not only on the grounds of social justice and legitimacy of the political system, but also because a higher number of women in public office, articulating interests and seen to be wielding power, will strike at the roots of gender hierarchy in public life.

“Without being sufficiently visible, a group’s ability to influence either policy-making, or indeed the political culture framing the representative system, is limited,” according to Pande.

“There needs to be a critical mass of women out there to put women’s issues on the political agenda,” he added.

A recent report by Oxfam International found that female-led panchayats (rural administrative units) perform better in the long-run than male-led panchayats on an index of eight services – drinking water, toilets, gutters, schools, ration shops, self-help groups, implementation of welfare schemes and reducing male alcoholism.

In the medium-term, states the study, the introduction of the Women’s Reservation Bill at the local level also leads to a significant increase in the reporting of crimes.

A 2012 working paper released by India’s premier research institution, the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER), found that higher political representation among women could also empower women to spend fewer hours on household chores, assert their reproductive choices and control their own resources.

Other experts, like Lakshmi Iyer, an associate professor at the Harvard Business School, say that electing more women to political office leads to improvements in women’s education and reductions in infant mortality, among other issues.

The fact that women make up nearly 25 percent of the newly sworn-in cabinet augurs well for the women’s movement.

This is the first time India has had seven women ministers, with six of them landing plum cabinet posts. The development is sparking hopes that the country will take bigger steps towards correcting its gender imbalance in politics.

(END)