INDIA – PLACES WHERE PROSTITUTION IS THE MAIN INCOME
Preeti Panwar – June 23, 2015
Although India is one of the fastest growing developing country today, but still, there are some dark corners in this country, that are lagging behind, with the present time.
They are alienated from the modern world and the lack of education is one of the prime reason for that.
It is hard to believe, that in the present scenario, India habituates some places where girls of the families are forced into prostitution, even before they reach puberty. Prostitution is a profession that has been into existence since ages. If we turn the pages of history, then, it will become evident that many courtesans used to be the muses of the erstwhile kings.
But, with the passage of time, this profession has undergone a lot of transformation. In some parts of India, prostitution is still considered as a main source of family income, in the guise of superstitious social traditions.
Most of the women, who chose this profession, willingly or forcibly, either hail from poor economic and financial background or they are dragged into this profession due to age-old traditions, to support the livelihood.
Let’s take a look at four places in India, where this dark profession is practiced as an open secret, and families feel no shame in telling that their daughters, sisters are into this profession.
Natpurwa village, Uttar Pradesh
This is the village in Hardoi district of eastern Uttar Pradesh, 70 kms from Lucknow, where Nat caste dominates. Strangely, in this village, children are not aware about the name of their fathers and they live with their mothers. They have no surnames.Shockingly, this bizarre norm exists since last 400 years. Around 5,000 people live in this village. More than 70 percent women of this village are into flesh trade.Over the years, women from this village have migrated to cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata and some have even shifted to Dubai.
Bachara tribe, Madhya Pradesh
Bachara is a tribal matriarchal community in the western part of Madhya Pradesh and women here are said to be the descendants of royal courtesans.Here, girls are forced into prostitution by their own fathers and brothers. The responsibility of making both ends meet is in the hands of the eldest daughter of the family. Most of such families have a dedicated room in their houses to continue this dreaded profession.
Wadia village, Gujarat
Known as “village of sex workers,” Wadia village in in Tharad taluka in Banaskantha district of north Gujarat, close to Rajasthan border, is famous for flesh trade on an enormous scale, since over last 80 years. Here, men search for customers for the women of their families and also negotiate the rates between Rs 500 to Rs 10,000.The small village is inhabited by a nomadic tribe called Saraniyas, where girls are groomed to become prostitutes at an early age and boys are trained to become pimps to find clients for them.However, nearby villages are against this tradition. Several education drives could not change the mindset of these people.
Devadasis in Karnataka
In the Devadasis belt, in Bellary and Koppal districts of Karnataka, the virginity of girls is auctioned off among the upper caste people. After this, girls spend rest of their lives as prostitutes, while earning for their families.The Devadasis community worships Hindu Goddess Yelamma. Devadasis literally means ‘slave of God’.According to the beliefs followed here, girls are married to the Goddess Yelamma, after which they dedicate their lives in the name of religion.Besides Karnataka, the Devadasi system continues in Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. IN 1982, devadasi system was outlawed, but it is still widely practiced.
Other prominent areas, where prostitution is a widely accepted profession are: Sonagachi, red light area in Kolkata, Kamathipura in Mumbai, Budhwar Peth in Pune, Itwari in Nagpur, Ganga Jamuna in Nagpur, Meergunj in Allahabad, Shivdaspur in Varanasi, Chaturbhujsthan in Muzaffarpur and GB Road in Delhi.
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Bachara tribe, Madhya Pradesh – Central India – Bachara is a tribal matriarchal community in the western part of Madhya Pradesh, and women here are said to be the descendants of royal courtesans. Here, girls are forced into prostitution by their own fathers and brothers, by overall family expectations. The responsibility of making both ends meet is in the hands of the eldest daughter of the family.
Direct Link to Video:
https://www.youtube.com:80/watch?v=B2mMN1dC6cU
Historic documentary of girl prostitutes in a region of the Bachara tribe/villages, where they follow the traditions of their mothers, grandmothers. But,
the film follows the story of one young girls who does have dreams for herself and to break away for a more independent life.
India – Highway Courtesans – Prostitution – Video
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/feminism/2015/11/inside-tiny-village-rajasthan-riven-sex-trade
INDIA – RAJASTHAN – TINY VILLAGE RIVEN BY THE SEX TRADE
By Julie Bindel* – November 18, 2015
Wadia is notorious as a place where men get rich from the sexual exploitation of women.
Wadia, a village in north Gujarat, close to the Rajasthan border, is famous for prostitution. Aside from a few exceptions, most of the boys are raised to be pimps, and the majority of girls, some as young as 12 years old, earn a living selling sex.
Men come to the village from as far afield as Ahmedabad, Pakistan, Rajasthan, and Mumbai to buy sex, with rates beginning at 500 rupees (£5).
The 600 inhabitants of Wadia are descendants of the nomadic Saraniya community. Saraniya men once worked for the army, which ruled over the region prior to India’s independence from Britain in 1947.
Ever since, realising how much money could be made from the sex trade, the majority of men in Wadia have continued soliciting buyers for their sisters, daughters, aunts, and even mothers.
I head out to Wadia from Gujarat’s main city, Ahmedabad, accompanied by a driver and translator, during Diwali. After almost four hours on the road we reach a hilly terrain and are directed onto a narrow road. Off this are several hamlets consisting of a few huts made from wood and plastic sheets.
I was told that it is unsafe for anyone to travel alone near Wadia. As my driver asks passersby for directions to the village he is warned by several that it is “bandit country”.
“It is very dangerous in Wadia,” says one elderly man walking his small herd of goats. “You will be robbed and maybe even worse.”
As we approach the village, the car is surrounded by a group of young men, all with sharp haircuts, designer jeans, diamond earrings, and good jewellery. They ask the driver why we are heading to Wadia, and whether we are carrying any weapons.
Arriving in Wadia I am met by Amr (not his real name), one of the main pimps in Wadia. Amr, who is in his 20s, speaks good English. He has whitened teeth and is wearing a large diamond earring. Amr immediately calls the man he refers to as the chief of the village, who quickly appears, dressed all in white and with his face hidden behind a large white scarf.
I am led to the porch of the village shop where at least 40 boys and men are gathered. I am given sweet, milky chai in a saucer and one of the two plastic chairs to sit on. The chief takes the other.
I ask Amr if the police try to impose the rule of law on the village. “They are corrupt,” he tells me. “Many are customers.”
No women or girls are visible as we arrive, and when I ask if I could meet some of the women, I am told, emphatically “no” by the chief. I ask why. “Because they will be scared of you,” he says. “They will think you are a police officer.”
There have been occasional attempts from outsiders to prevent the sexual exploitation that has become the fabric of Wadia society.
Vicharti Samudaya Samarpan Manch (VSSM), an NGO working to improve the education and welfare of nomadic tribes in the region, decided that the only way to break the cycle of prostitution was to marry off as many girls as possible. In March 2012, a mass wedding ceremony was organised at which eight young women were married and twelve girls, aged between 12 and 17, engaged. Some of the bridegrooms were regular sex buyers at the village. Most of the women, once married, would still be required to sell sex, with their husbands living off their earnings.
Daughters of prostituted women in Wadia are considered unmarriageable, so they too are forced into prostitution as the only way to survive.
During my tour of the village, on which I was accompanied by a reluctant Amr, I saw several women and girls, dressed in pink or red saris, scurrying into their huts when they spotted me. One woman was going into a half-erected brick building with a man I assumed to be a sex buyer.
My translator tells me that each of the newly-built houses are brothels, and the old huts are the family homes. “Ninety nine per cent are prostitutes,” he says. “The man with the white handkerchief, big broker [pimp]. His wife, mother, sister, daughter – all prostitutes.”
I ask Amr what age the girls start selling sex, and was told, “not before 18”, but according to VSSM it can be as young as 12. I was told by Amr that the women all like their work; the customers are never violent; there are no STIs; and that at most, only one-fifth of the women in Wadia are in prostitution.
Despite the obvious poverty in the village, there are also pockets of wealth. Many of the older men had expensive iPhones, and three of those I met were attending colleague in Ahmedabad.
“The women are in [prostitution] for life”, Amr tells me, as I say goodbye, “They are illiterate, it is all there is for them.” Clearly pimping is more lucrative for the men than prostitution is for the women.
On asking my colleagues involved in the sex trade abolitionist movement in India if they had heard of Wadia, I soon discovered that this tiny village had almost the same notoriety and potency as Nevada, the only state that allows legal brothels in the US.
Wadia is far away from the legalised sex industries of Nevada, Germany and the Netherlands, but it has something fundamentally in common with those prosperous nations.
Where prostitution is seen as part of the economy and a job like any other, and men are given free reign to treat women’s bodies as a commodity, gender equality will remain a distant dream.
*Julie Bindel is a journalist and author. Her book about the international sex trade will be published by Palgrave McMillan in 2016.
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