Sex Workers: Repositories of the “Bad”?

The recent proposal by the Chairperson of India's National Commission of Women to legalize sex work in India has sparked of a debate around the polarizing subject of prostitution. Sex work, the term being increasingly used by organizations of people in prostitution, itself provokes outrage across a broad spectrum in India, from the conservative to the progressive and feminist. The fact that sex worker/prostitute evokes such strong reactions invites scrutiny.

In a society with tremendous divides of caste, class, gender and ethnicity sex workers are at the bottom of the ladder. The law and its working are illustrative of the way sex workers are looked upon in society. The law pertaining to prostitution enacted in 1956 was called the Suppression of Immoral Traffic Act. The origins as well as the title of the legislation itself reflect the conception of sex work as being synonymous with trafficking and its stigmatization. The legislation was enacted in pursuance of the 1950 ratification by the government of India of the International Convention for the Suppression of Traffic in Persons and of the exploitation of the prostitution of others. The law does not directly criminalize sex work, but treats all acts around it like soliciting, running a brothel, and living off the earnings of prostitution as offences. The “raid and rescue” procedure violates the dignity and the privacy of the individual and makes no distinction between adults and minors with regard to consent. Invariably, the women “rescued” feel they have been “arrested” and imprisoned. Regardless of the initial mode of entry, the wishes of an adult individual must be ascertained before any “rescue” goes forward - an adult, could well choose to remain in sex work. Discriminatory provisions abound in law violating the right to live and work in liberty and dignity, the right to move unhindered, the right to reside in a place of choice and the right to migrate - in short, the right of a sex worker to