Prostitution is legal in India, but a number of related activities including

soliciting Solicitation is the act of offering, or attempting to purchase, goods and/or services. Legal status may be specific to the time or place where it occurs. The crime of "solicitation to commit a crime" occurs when a person encourages, "solicits, r ...

kerb crawling Clients of prostitutes or sex workers are sometimes known as ''johns'' or ''tricks'' in North America and ''punters'' in Britain and Ireland. In common parlance among prostitutes as well as with others, the act of negotiating and then engaging with ...

, owning or managing a brothel, prostitution in a

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a re ...

, child prostitution, pimping and pandering are illegal. There are, however, many brothels illegally operating in Indian cities including

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders ...

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

Bangalore Bangalore (), List of renamed places in India, officially Bengaluru (), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan area, metropolitan population of a ...

, and

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

UNAIDS The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS) (, ONUSIDA) is the main advocate for accelerated, comprehensive and coordinated global action on the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The mission of UNAIDS is to lead, strengthen and support an ...

estimate there were 657,829 prostitutes in the country as of 2016. Other unofficial estimates have calculated India has roughly 3–10 million prostitutes. India is widely regarded as having one of the world's largest commercial

sex industry The sex industry (also called the sex trade) consists of businesses that either directly or indirectly provide sex-related products and services or adult entertainment. The industry includes activities involving direct provision of sex-related ...

. It has emerged as a global hub of sex tourism, attracting sex tourists from wealthy countries. The sex industry in India is a multi-billion dollar one, and one of the fastest growing.

History

tawaif A ''tawaif'' was a highly successful entertainer who catered to the nobility of the Indian subcontinent, particularly during the Mughal era. The tawaifs excelled in and contributed to music, dance ( mujra), theatre, and the Urdu literary tradi ...

was a

courtesan Courtesan, in modern usage, is a euphemism for a "kept" mistress or prostitute, particularly one with wealthy, powerful, or influential clients. The term historically referred to a courtier, a person who attended the court of a monarch or other ...

who catered to the nobility of India, particularly during the Mughal era. The tawaifs excelled in and contributed to music, dance (

mujra Mujra is a dance performance by women in a format that emerged during Mughal rule in India, where the elite class and local rulers like the nawabs of the Indian society (often connected to the Mughal emperor's court) used to frequent courtesan ...

), theatre, and the

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' etiquette. Tawaifs were largely a North Indian institution central to Mughal court culture from the 16th century onwards and became even more prominent with the weakening of Mughal rule in the mid-18th century. They contributed significantly to the continuation of traditional dance and music forms and then emergence of modern Indian cinema.

Goa Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the ...

was a colony in Portuguese India set up in the early 16th century, and this Portuguese stronghold contained a community of Portuguese slaves. During the late 16th and 17th centuries the Portuguese trade in Japanese slaves resulted in traders from the

Portuguese Empire The Portuguese Empire ( pt, Império Português), also known as the Portuguese Overseas (''Ultramar Português'') or the Portuguese Colonial Empire (''Império Colonial Português''), was composed of the overseas colonies, factories, and the ...

and their captive ''

lascar A lascar was a sailor or militiaman from the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, the Arab world, British Somaliland, or other land east of the Cape of Good Hope, who was employed on European ships from the 16th century until the middle of the ...

'' crew members from

South Asia South Asia is the southern subregion of Asia, which is defined in both geographical Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth descr ...

bringing

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

slaves to Goa. These were usually young Japanese women and girls brought or captured from Japan as sexual slaves. The culture of the performing art of ''

nautch The nautch (; meaning "dance" or "dancing")Scott A. Kugle, 2016When Sun Meets Moon: Gender, Eros, and Ecstasy in Urdu Poetry p.230. was a popular court dance performed by girls (known as "nautch girls") in India. The culture of the performing ...

'', an alluring style of popular dance, rose to prominence during the later period of

Mughal Empire The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...

and the rule of the

British East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and South ...

. During the period of Company rule (and after the

Indian Rebellion of 1857 The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was a major uprising in India in 1857–58 against the rule of the British East India Company, which functioned as a sovereign power on behalf of the British Crown. The rebellion began on 10 May 1857 in the fo ...

, the direct administration of the British Crown), British military elements established and maintained brothels across the Indian subcontinent. The prostitutes who worked in such brothels were recruited from rural Indian families and paid directly by the British authoriites. The red-light districts of cities such as Mumbai developed at this time. The governments of many Indian princely states had regulated prostitution in India prior to the 1860s. The British Raj enacted the Cantonment Act of 1864 to regulate prostitution in colonial India as a matter of accepting a necessary evil. The Cantonment Acts regulated and structured prostitution in the British

military bases A military base is a facility directly owned and operated by or for the military or one of its branches that shelters military equipment and personnel, and facilitates training and Military operation, operations. A military base always provides ...

which provided for about twelve to fifteen Indian women kept in brothels called ''chaklas'' for each regiment of thousand British soldiers. They were licensed by military officials and were allowed to consort with soldiers only. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, thousands of women and girls from continental Europe and Japan were trafficked into

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...

, where they worked as prostitutes servicing British soldiers and local Indian men. According to Priti Patkar, a Maharashtra-based social activist working with sex workers in the state, many sex workers were forced to take loans from private lenders at high interest rates during the first wave of the Covid pandemic. “We conducted a survey during the first wave which revealed sex workers were taking loans to survive. For their daily meals, they were entirely dependent on donations. We have not conducted any such survey during the second wave, but we have heard the same thing has happened this time, too,” said Patkar, who leads the NGO, Prerana.

Profession types

Professions sometimes related to prostitution * Nochi, young female trainee under a Tawaif * Kanjari, low-class uncultured Tawaif * Kasbi, a female belonging to family which practices hereditary sex trade over several generations *

Nautch girl The nautch (; meaning "dance" or "dancing")Scott A. Kugle, 2016When Sun Meets Moon: Gender, Eros, and Ecstasy in Urdu Poetry p.230. was a popular court dance performed by girls (known as "nautch girls") in India. The culture of the performing ...

, assorted dance performer during colonial India for all classes of people *

Tawaif A ''tawaif'' was a highly successful entertainer who catered to the nobility of the Indian subcontinent, particularly during the Mughal era. The tawaifs excelled in and contributed to music, dance ( mujra), theatre, and the Urdu literary tradi ...

, an elegant and cultured

who is master of arts, including singing and dancing Other related, often misunderstood, but traditionally, originally ''non''-prostitution professions: *

Devdasi In India, a devadasi was a female artist who was dedicated to the worship and service of a deity or a temple for the rest of her life. The dedication took place in a ceremony that was somewhat similar to a marriage ceremony. In addition to taki ...

, temple dancer devoted to the practice of spiritual dancing * Domni, a hereditary female singerThe Nautch - Ally Adnan on the colorful dancing girls who dazzled India in the 19th century

The Times of India ''The Times of India'', also known by its abbreviation ''TOI'', is an Indian English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by The Times Group. It is the third-largest newspaper in India by circulation and largest ...

, 1 August 2014.

Organisation

Government organisations like MDACS (Maharashtra District AIDS Control Society) have played a very prominent role in generating awareness on HIV/AIDS, through the assistance in providing free literature and organising street campaigns. There are several NGOs that work to prevent the spread of STI/STDs in the community. NACO (National AIDS Control Organisation), a government agency leads these NGOs. The Durbar Mahila Sumanwua Committee is a sex-workers' union based in Sonagachi, Kolkata, which has 65,000 members. They advocate for labour rights for sex workers, and they also fight against trafficking.

Prevalence

There were an estimated two million female sex workers in the country in 1997. In 2007, the Ministry of Women and Child Development reported the presence of over 3 million female

sex worker A sex worker is a person who provides sex work, either on a regular or occasional basis. The term is used in reference to those who work in all areas of the sex industry.Oxford English Dictionary, "sex worker" According to one view, sex work i ...

s in India, with 35.47 percent of them entering the trade before the age of 18 years. The number of prostitutes rose by 50% between 1997 and 2004.

Areas of work

Brothels are illegal ''

de jure In law and government, ''de jure'' ( ; , "by law") describes practices that are legally recognized, regardless of whether the practice exists in reality. In contrast, ("in fact") describes situations that exist in reality, even if not legally ...

'' but in practice are restricted to certain areas of any given town. Though the profession does not have official sanction, little effort is made to eradicate or impede it. India's largest and best-known red-light districts are

Sonagachi Sonagachi is a neighbourhood in Kolkata, India, located in North Kolkata near the intersection of Jatindra Mohan Avenue (north of C.R. Avenue) with Beadon Street and Sovabazar, about one kilometer north of the Marble Palace area.} Sonagachi is ...

, Majestic in

, Reshampura in

Gwalior Gwalior() is a major city in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh; it lies in northern part of Madhya Pradesh and is one of the Counter-magnet cities. Located south of Delhi, the capital city of India, from Agra and from Bhopal, the s ...

Kamathipura Kamathipura (also spelled Kamthipura) is a neighbourhood in Mumbai, India known for prostitution. It was first settled after 1795 with the construction of causeways that connected the erstwhile seven islands of Mumbai. Initially known as Lal ...

, Sonapur in

and G. B. Road in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament Ho ...

, that host thousands of sex workers. Earlier, there were centres such as Naqqasa Bazaar in

Saharanpur Saharanpur is a city and a municipal corporation in Uttar Pradesh, India. It is also the administrative headquarters of Saharanpur district. Saharanpur city's name was given after the Saint Shah Haroon Chishti. Saharanpur is declared as on ...

, Chaturbhuj Sthan in

Muzaffarpur Muzaffarpur () is a city located in Muzaffarpur district in the Tirhut region of the Indian state of Bihar. It serves as the headquarters of the Tirhut division, the Muzaffarpur district and the Muzaffarpur Railway District. It is the fourth ...

, Lalpur, Maruadih in

Varanasi Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world. * * * * The city has a syncretic t ...

, Meerganj in Allahabad, Kalinganj in Azamgarh and Kabadi bazar of

Meerut Meerut (, IAST: ''Meraṭh'') is a city in Meerut district of the western part of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The city lies northeast of the national capital New Delhi, within the National Capital Region and west of the state capital ...

Underage prostitution

Surveys show there are an estimated 1.2 million children involved in prostitution.

Research

Much new knowledge on sex work in India came from the first major survey, in April 2011. This was performed by the Centre for Advocacy on Stigma and Marginalisation (CASAM), which is part of SANGRAM, a major NGO that deals with sex workers.

Legal status

The law is vague on prostitution itself. The primary law dealing with the status of sex workers is the 1956 law referred to as The Immoral Traffic (Suppression) Act (SITA). According to this law, prostitutes can practise their trade privately but cannot legally solicit customers in public. A BBC article, however, mentions that prostitution is illegal in India; the Indian law does not refer to the practice of selling one's own sexual service as "prostitution". Clients can be punished for sexual activity in proximity to a public place. Organised prostitution (

brothels A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub ...

, prostitution rings, pimping, etc.) is illegal. As long as it is done individually and voluntarily, a woman (

male prostitution Male prostitution is the act or practice of men providing sexual services in return for payment. It is a form of sex work. Although clients can be of any gender, the vast majority are older males looking to fulfill their sexual needs. Male pro ...

is not recognised in any law in India) can use her body in exchange for material benefit. In particular, the law forbids a sex worker to carry on her profession within 200 yards of a public place. Unlike as is the case with other professions, sex workers are not protected under normal labour laws, but they possess the right to rescue and rehabilitation if they desire, and they possess all the rights of other citizens. In practice SITA is not commonly used. The

Indian Penal Code The Indian Penal Code (IPC) is the official criminal code of India. It is a comprehensive code intended to cover all substantive aspects of criminal law. The code was drafted on the recommendations of first law commission of India established ...

(IPC) which predates the SITA is often used to charge sex workers with vague crimes such as "

public indecency Indecent exposure is the deliberate public exposure by a person of a portion of their body in a manner contrary to local standards of appropriate behavior. Laws and social attitudes regarding indecent exposure vary significantly in different ...

" or being a "public nuisance" without explicitly defining what these consist of. In 1986 the old law was amended as the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act or ITPA. Attempts to amend this to criminalise clients have been opposed by the Health Ministry, and has encountered considerable opposition. In a positive development in the improvement of the lives of female sex workers in Calcutta, a state-owned insurance company has provided life insurance to 250 individuals. Over the years, India saw a growing mandate to legalise prostitution, to avoid exploitation of sex workers and their children by middlemen and in the wake of a growing HIV/AIDS menace. Supreme Court of India; on May 19, 2022, upheld that everyone, including sex workers are guaranteed the right to dignity and life under Article 21 of Constitution of India. Thus, sex workers can not be harassed and arrested legally. Brothel related practices still remain illegal.

Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act

The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, or ITPA, also called the Prevention of Immoral Trafficking Act (PITA) is a 1986 amendment of legislation passed in 1956 as a result of the signing by India of the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...

' declaration in 1950 in New York on the suppression of

trafficking Smuggling is the illegal transportation of objects, substances, information or people, such as out of a house or buildings, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations. There are various ...

. The Immoral traffic Prevention Act The act, then called the All India Suppression of Immoral Traffic Act (SITA), was amended to the current law. The laws were intended as a means of limiting and eventually abolishing prostitution in India by gradually criminalising various aspects of

sex work Sex work is "the exchange of sexual services, performances, or products for material compensation. It includes activities of direct physical contact between buyers and sellers as well as indirect sexual stimulation". Sex work only refers to volun ...

. The main points of the PITA are as follows: * Sex Workers: A prostitute who seduces or solicits shall be prosecuted. Similarly,

call girl A call girl or female escort is a sex worker who (unlike a street walker) does not display her profession to the general public, nor does she usually work in an institution like a brothel, although she may be employed by an escort agency.< ...

s can not publish phone numbers to the public. (imprisonment up to 6 months with fine, point 8)
Sex workers are also punished for prostitution near any public place or notified area. (Imprisonment of up to 3 months with fine, point 7) * Clients: A client is guilty of consorting with prostitutes and can be charged if he engages in sex acts with a sex worker within 200

yard The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 inches. Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly ...

s of a public place or "notified area". (Imprisonment of up to 3 months, point 7) The client may also be punished if the sex worker is below 18 years of age. (From 7 to 10 years of imprisonment, no matter the age of the minor, point 7) *Pimps : pimps or live-in lovers who live off a prostitute's

earnings Earnings are the net benefits of a corporation's operation. Earnings is also the amount on which corporate tax is due. For an analysis of specific aspects of corporate operations several more specific terms are used as EBIT (earnings before intere ...

are guilty of a crime. Any adult male living with a prostitute is assumed to be guilty unless he can prove otherwise. (Imprisonment of up to 2 years with fine, point 4) *Brothel: Landlords and brothel-keepers can be prosecuted, maintaining a brothel is illegal. (From 1 to 3 years' imprisonment with fine for first offence, point 3) Detaining someone at a brothel for the purpose of sexual exploitation can lead to prosecution. (Imprisonment of more than 7 years, point 6)
Prostitution in a

is also a criminal offence. *Procuring and trafficking: A person procures or attempts to

procure Procurement is the method of discovering and agreeing to terms and purchasing goods, services, or other works from an external source, often with the use of a tendering or competitive bidding process. When a government agency buys goods or servi ...

anybody is liable to be punished. Also a person who moves a person from one place to another, ( human trafficking), can be prosecuted similarly. (7 years' imprisonment with fine for first conviction, and up to life imprisonment thereafter; point 5B) *Rescued Women: The government is legally obligated to provide rescue and rehabilitation in a "protective home" for any sex worker requesting assistance. (Point 21) Public place in context of this law includes places of public religious worship, educational institutions, hostels, hospitals etc. A "notified area" is a place which is declared to be "prostitution-free" by the state government under the PITA. Brothel in context of this law, is a place which has two or more sex workers (2a). Prostitution itself is not an offence under this law, but soliciting, brothels, madams and pimps are illegal.

Political and legal debates

In 2006 the Ministry of Women and Child Development put forward a bill aimed at reducing human trafficking. The bill proposed criminalising the clients of trafficked prostitutes. However, it stalled during the legislative process, and legislation against human trafficking was subsequently effected by amendments to the Indian Penal Code. Clauses in the ITPA relating to living off the earnings of a sex-worker are being challenged in court, together with criminalisation of brothels, prostitution around a notified public place, soliciting and the power given to a magistrate to evict sex-workers from their home and forbidding their re-entry. Other groups are lobbying parliament for amendments to the law. In 2009 the Supreme Court ruled that prostitution should be legalised and convened a panel to consider amending the law. In 2011 the Supreme Court held that "right to live with dignity" is a Constitutional right and issued an order relating to "creating conditions conducive for sex workers to work with dignity". The court directed the Central Government, States and Union Territories to carry out a survey to determine the number of sex workers in the country willing to be rehabilitated. However, in 2012 the Central Government made a plea to the Supreme Court arguing that sex workers should not be allowed to pursue their trade under the constitutional "right to live with dignity". Government counsel contended that any such endorsement by the court would be

ultra vires ('beyond the powers') is a Latin phrase used in law to describe an act which requires legal authority but is done without it. Its opposite, an act done under proper authority, is ('within the powers'). Acts that are may equivalently be termed ...

of ITPA, which totally bans prostitution. Opposing counsel submitted that the Act only prohibited brothel activities and punitive action against pimps. The Supreme Court agreed to examine the plea.

Reasons for entry

American GI soliciting prostitution in Calcutta in 1945

Most of the research done by the development organisation

Sanlaap Sanlaap is an Indian feminist non-governmental organisation, established by Indrani Sinha in 1987 in Calcutta. Based in Calcutta, the group aims to protect the human rights of women and girls. Sanlaap is a developmental organisation that work ...

indicates that the majority of sex workers in India work as prostitutes due to lacking resources to support themselves or their children. Most do not choose this profession but out of necessity, often after the breakup of a marriage or after being disowned and thrown out of their homes by their families. The children of sex workers are much more likely to get involved in this kind of work as well. A survey completed in 1988 by the

All Bengal Women's Union The All Bengal Women's Union was started in the 1932, when a group of women in West Bengal formed a cadre of like-minded women to help their helpless, exploited and victimized fellow women. The genesis of the group lay in the fact that trafficki ...

interviewed a random sample of 160 sex workers in Calcutta: Of those, 23 claimed that they had come of their own accord, whereas the remaining 137 women claimed to have been introduced into the sex trade by agents. The breakdown was as follows: * Neighbour in connivance with parents: 7 * Neighbours as pimps (guardians not knowing): 19 * Aged sex workers from same village or locality: 31 * Unknown person/accidental meeting with pimp: 32 * Mother/sister/near relative in the profession: 18 * Lover giving false hope of marriage or job and selling to brothel: 14 * Close acquaintance giving false hope of marriage or job: 11 * "Husband" (not legally married): 3 * Husband (legally married): 1 * Young college student selling to brothel and visiting free of cost: 1 The breakdown of the agents by sex were as follows: 76% of the agents were female and 24% were males. Over 80% of the agents bring young women into the profession were known people and not traffickers: neighbours, relatives, etc. Also prevalent in parts of

Bengal Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...

is the Chukri System, whereby a female is coerced into prostitution to pay off debts, as a form of

bonded labour Debt bondage, also known as debt slavery, bonded labour, or peonage, is the pledge of a person's services as security for the repayment for a debt or other obligation. Where the terms of the repayment are not clearly or reasonably stated, the pe ...

. In this system, the prostitute generally works without pay for one year or longer to repay a supposed debt to the brothel owner for food, clothes, make-up and living expenses. In India, the Government's "central sponsored scheme" provides financial or in-kind grants to released bonded labourers and their family members, the report noted, adding over 2,850,000 people have benefited to date. Almost 5,000 prosecutions have been recorded so far under the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act of 1976. Some women and girls are by tradition born into prostitution to support the family. The Bachara Tribe, for example, follow this tradition with eldest daughters often expected to be prostitutes. Over 40% of 484 prostituted girls rescued during major raids of brothels in Mumbai in 1996 were from

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

. In India one estimate calculated that as many as 200,000 Nepalese girls, many under the age of 14, were sold into sexual slavery during the 1990s.

Sex worker health

Sex workers in India find it difficult to access health care and face discrimination, especially in government hospitals, based on their profession, such as being forced to take tests for sexually transmitted infection when they are ill, being refused to be admitted to hospitals without HIV tests, being refused to conduct physical examination before prescribing medication. Surveys have found that sex workers prefer private health care providers over the government ones where they have some kind of sensitisation training. Difficulty in accessing health care is due to factors such as hospitals sending women to their husband for approval to get abortion, financial hurdles such as high fees for abortion and difficulty procuring identification documents as many sex workers like unstable lives, having trouble providing a proof of address. A Supreme Court verdict in 2021 directed that sex workers be provided Aadhar and ration without asking for proof of address, which made the situation better for sex workers. In government hospitals, sometimes it is not even doctors who do abortions for sex workers, but ward boys will do. Sex workers also lack privacy in hospitals because people think they are okay with anybody looking at their private parts. Transgender sex workers face even more discrimination than women sex workers due to doctors' lack of knowledge of transperson bodies, hospitals not having separate queues for transpeople and hospitals not assigning them doctors but rather rush them to testing centres.

and

(Calcutta) have the country's largest brothel based sex industry, with over 100,000 sex workers in Mumbai."Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: India"

US State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...

, 2001. It is estimated that HIV among prostitutes have largely fallen, in last decade. A positive outcome of a prevention programme among prostitutes can be found in

, a red-light district in Kolkata. The education programme targeted about 5,000 female prostitutes. A team of two peer workers carried out outreach activities including education, condom promotion and follow-up of STI cases. When the project was launched in 1992, 27% of sex workers reported condom use. By 1995 this had risen to 82%, and in 2001 it was 86%. Reaching women who are working in brothels has proven to be quite difficult due to the sheltered and secluded nature of the work, where pimps, Mashis, and brothel-keepers often control access to the women and prevent their access to education, resulting in a low to modest literacy rate for many sex workers. Not only HIV but other infection diseases have been decreased, examined data from 868 prevention projects—serving about 500,000 female sex workers—implemented between 1995 and 2008. The research found that reaching sex workers through prevention programs decreased HIV and syphilis infection rates among young pregnant women tested routinely at government prenatal health clinics.

Foreign prostitutes

Women and girls from China,

Arab countries The Arab world ( ar, اَلْعَالَمُ الْعَرَبِيُّ '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, refers to a vast group of countries, mainly located in Western As ...

, Japan, the

former Soviet Republics The post-Soviet states, also known as the former Soviet Union (FSU), the former Soviet Republics and in Russia as the near abroad (russian: links=no, ближнее зарубежье, blizhneye zarubezhye), are the 15 sovereign states that wer ...

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

, Sri Lanka and from other origins have been noted as working as prostitutes in India. In 2015, ten Thai women were arrested in India on prostitution charges for allegedly running two brothels masquerading as massage parlours. In 2013 there were reports of Afghan women being trafficked as prostitutes to India. Uzbek women go to India to work as prostitutes.

Sex trafficking

India is a source, destination, and transit country for women and children subjected to sex trafficking. Most of India's trafficking problem is internal, and those from the most disadvantaged social strata—economically, members of tribal communities—are most vulnerable. Thousands of unregulated work placement agencies reportedly lure adults and children under false promises of employment into sex trafficking. Experts estimate millions of women and children are victims of sex trafficking in India. Traffickers use false promises of employment or arrange sham marriages within India or Gulf states and subject women and girls to sex trafficking. In addition to traditional red light districts, women and children increasingly endure sex trafficking in small hotels, vehicles, huts, and private residences. Traffickers increasingly use websites, mobile applications, and online money transfers to facilitate commercial sex. Children continue to be subjected to sex trafficking in religious pilgrimage centers and by foreign travelers in tourist destinations. Many women and girls, predominately from Nepal and Bangladesh, and from Central Asia, Africa, and Asia, including Rohingya and other minority populations from Burma, are subjected to sex trafficking in India. Prime destinations for both Indian and foreign female trafficking victims include Kolkata, Mumbai, Delhi, Gujarat, Hyderabad, and along the India-Nepal border; Nepali women and girls are increasingly subjected to sex trafficking in Assam, and other cities such as Nagpur and Pune. Some corrupt law enforcement officers protect suspected traffickers and brothel owners from law enforcement efforts, take bribes from sex trafficking establishments and sexual services from victims, and tip off sex traffickers to impede rescue efforts. Some Nepali, Bangladeshi, Afghan, and Iranian women and girls are subjected to both labor and sex trafficking in major Indian cities. Following the 2015 Nepal earthquakes, Nepali women who transit through India are increasingly subjected to trafficking in the Middle East and Africa. The

United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government responsible for the country's fore ...

Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons The Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (J/TIP) is an agency within the United States Department of State charged with investigating and creating programs to prevent human trafficking both within the United States and internation ...

ranks India as a ' Tier 2' country.

Popular culture

Prostitution has been a theme in Indian literature and arts for centuries. '' Mrichakatika'', a ten-act Sanskrit play, was written by Śhudraka in the 2nd century BC, and tells the story of a famous courtesan, Vasantsena. It was made into ''

Utsav ''Utsav'' (Hindi: उत्सव; English: Festival) is a 1984 Hindi erotic drama film, produced by Shashi Kapoor and directed by Girish Karnad. The film is based on play '' Mrichakatika'' ('' The Little Clay Cart'') by Śūdraka. The film s ...

'', a 1984

Hindi Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...

film.

Amrapali Āmrapālī, also known as "Ambapālika", "Ambapali", or "Amra" was a celebrated '' nagarvadhu'' (royal courtesan) of the republic of Vaishali (located in present-day Bihar) in ancient India around 500 BC. Following the Buddha's teachings, she ...

(Ambapali), the legendary

nagarvadhu Nagarvadhu or Nagar Vadhu (Devanagari: नगरवधू) ("bride of the city") was a tradition followed in some parts of ancient India. Women competed to win the title of a Nagarvadhu, and there was no taboo against the practice. The most bea ...

, or royal courtesan of the Kingdom of Vaishali, famously became an enlightened Buddhist monk later in her life - a story retold in a Hindi film, ''

'' (1966). The

, or elite

in the

Mughal era The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...

, has been a theme of a number of films, including ''

Pakeezah ''Pakeezah'' (; ) is a 1972 Indian Hindustani language, Hindustani-language Musical film, musical romantic drama film that was written, directed, and produced by Kamal Amrohi. The film stars Ashok Kumar, Meena Kumari, and Raaj Kumar. It tells ...

'' (1972), '' Umrao Jaan'' (1981), ''Tawaif'' (1985), '' Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love'' (1996) and '' Umrao Jaan'' (2006). Other movies depicting lives of prostitutes and dancing girls are ''

Sharaabi ''Sharaabi'' ( en, Drunkard, italic=yes) is a 1984 Indian Hindi comedy drama film produced and directed by Prakash Mehra. This was Mehra's sixth film with Amitabh Bachchan. Sharaabi stars Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Prada in lead roles along wi ...

'' (1984), ''

Amar Prem ''Amar Prem'' () is a 1972 Indian Hindi romantic drama film directed by Shakti Samanta. It is a remake of the Bengali film ''Nishi Padma'' (1970), directed by Arabinda Mukherjee, who wrote screenplay for both the films based on the Bengali sh ...

'' (1972), '' Mausam'' (1975) '' Mandi'' (1983), ''

Devdas ''Devdas'' ( bn, দেবদাস, transliterated as ''Debdās'') is a Bengali romance novel written by Sarat Chandra Chatterjee. The story pivots a tragic triangle linking Devdas, an archetypal lover in viraha (separation); Paro, his forbidd ...

'' (2002), ''

Chandni Bar ''Chandni Bar'' is a 2001 Indian Hindi-language crime drama film directed by Madhur Bhandarkar. It depicts the gritty life of the Mumbai underworld, including prostitution, dance bars and gun crime. The film stars Tabu and Atul Kulkarni in l ...

'' (2001), '' Chameli'' (2003), ''

Laaga Chunari Mein Daag ''Laaga Chunari Mein Daag – Journey Of A Woman'' () is a 2007 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Pradeep Sarkar and starring Jaya Bachchan, Rani Mukherji, Konkona Sen Sharma, Anupam Kher, Kunal Kapoor and Abhishek Bachchan. Produc ...

, Sadak'' (2007), ''Dev D'' (2009), '' B.A. Pass'' (2013), ''Thira'' (2013) and '' Begum Jaan'' (2017). Various fictional films have featured the subject of prostitution in India, including ''

Slumdog Millionaire ''Slumdog Millionaire'' is a 2008 British drama film that is a loose adaptation of the novel '' Q & A'' (2005) by Indian author Vikas Swarup. It narrates the story of 18-year-old Jamal Malik from the Juhu slums of Mumbai. Starring Dev Pa ...

'' (2008), ''

Chaarfutiya Chhokare ''Chaarfutiya Chhokare'' () is a 2014 Indian Hindi-language thriller film, written and directed by Manish Harishankar and produced by Sunill Khosla & Vibha Dutta Khosla. The storyline is based on the subject of child-trafficking. The film featur ...

'' (2014), ''

Manoranjan ''Manoranjan'' () is a 1974 Indian Hindi film directed by Shammi Kapoor. It is a remake of '' Irma La Douce''. Sanjeev Kumar plays Jack Lemmon's role, Zeenat Aman Shirley MacLaine's and Shammi Kapoor plays Lou Jacobi's. Hotel Casanova is called ...

'' (1974), '' Soothradharan'' (2001)'', Calcutta News'' (2008), ''

Lakshmi Lakshmi (; , sometimes spelled Laxmi, ), also known as Shri (, ), is one of the principal goddesses in Hinduism. She is the goddess of wealth, fortune, power, beauty, fertility and prosperity, and associated with ''Maya'' ("Illusion"). Alo ...

'' (2014), Love Sonia (2018),

Gangubai Kathiawadi ''Gangubai Kathiawadi'' is a 2022 Indian Hindi-language biographical crime drama film directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali and produced by Bhansali and Jayantilal Gada. The film stars Alia Bhatt as the titular character with Ajay Devgn, Shantanu ...

(2022) among others. ''

Born into Brothels ''Born into Brothels: Calcutta's Red Light Kids'' is a 2004 Indian-American documentary film about the children of prostitutes in Sonagachi, Kolkata's red light district. The widely acclaimed film, written and directed by Zana Briski and Ross ...

'', a 2004 American documentary film about the children of prostitutes in

, won the

Academy Award for Documentary Feature The Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film is an award for documentary films. In 1941, the first awards for feature-length documentaries were bestowed as Special Awards to '' Kukan'' and ''Target for Tonight''. They have since been best ...

in 2004. Delhi-based woman film maker Shohini Ghosh made a documentary film "Tales of the Night Fairies" in 2002, interviewing five sex workers who are activists of the DMSC sex-worker union in Kolkata. DMSC fights against trafficking and advocates for labour rights for sex-workers.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * Gomare et al. 2002. ''Adopting strategic approach for reaching out to inaccessible population viz'' Abstract WePeF6707F abstract, The XIV International AIDS Conference. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * . * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

US State Department Annual Human Rights Reports about India

Navjeevan Mumbai
Sex work outreach
The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act 1956

Legalise prostitution in India to address problems of sex industry
Article by K Rajasekharan {{DEFAULTSORT:Prostitution In India Society of India Indian culture