JOIN USTamanna (name changed), 17, was rescued from a brothel on GB Road last month following a raid. Being a minor, she was sent to a child care centre, from where she is expected to be reunited with her parents in West Bengal.
It looks like the perfect ending of a story. However, far from it, the reality is lot different. Tamanna is the fourth daughter of her parents who are agricultural labourers in West Bengal’s Malda district.
“They are so poor that they had to send her with someone to Delhi to work as a housemaid. But as soon as she reached here, her documents were snatched away and she was locked in a room at one of the brothels. She was repeatedly raped for days and then “presented” before customers when she was ready,” says Jyoti, an NGO worker.
Now that she is free, Tamanna is not sure whether her parents would be happy seeing her back. “The main reason she was pushed into prostitution was her poverty and unemployment. Without addressing those reasons her freedom is short-lived,” says Suleman George, director, Delhi Brotherhood Society, an NGO.
According to George there is not a single scheme by the centre or state government yet which addresses the issue of rehabilitation of sex workers. “With no sound rehabilitation policy in place for them, sex workers continue in the profession as they feel they don’t have any other option. It is a vicious cycle. The trafficked becomes the trafficker after a point of time. Their sons become pimps. There is no end to this,” says Suleman George.
As per a study by the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) 60.7% of the sex workers who were surveyed said that they had children. 54.7% said that their children were not residing with them. The children were found to be mostly staying with the parents of sex workers.
For several sex workers in GB Road, educating children is raising them in hometowns and away from the dark lanes of the brothels. Growing up on GB Road is “not desirable”. Children often feel stigmatised when peers from outside the community come to know of the background.
“Those who stay with their mothers have a negative growth pattern and develop different kinds of behavioral difficulties since they are exposed to negative environment right from their childhood,” George says.
“Government must make provisions for day and night creche facilities. Formal and non formal education and life skills training need to be made available to the children. When they grow up employment opportunities must be made available so that they are not forced to end up as sex workers," George adds.
The middle-aged sex workers, especially, should be rehabilitated to stop second-generation prostitution. As it is the number of clients for them is dwindling.
“Civil society organisations have repeatedly demanded that the government opens a residential school for young and adolescent children in GB Road itself. This should also double as an open home for day boarders. The school will not only provide quality education but also impart vocational training. In this case, the children can live in proximity to their mothers and also focus on their interest areas in a competitive space,” says Jyoti.
Both the central and the state government have failed to bring out a rehabilitation policy till now. In fact it was only after the intervention of the Delhi Commission for Women that the Delhi government’s state-level coordination committee on trafficking met for the first time last year on October.
The committee planned to rehabilitate 50 women on a pilot basis by giving them professional placements instead of just skill development.
“The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) specifically told the committee that should venture in this project only if they can provide jobs. The focus should not only be on skill development. The sex workers or others, who have been trafficked, cannot earn their livelihood through these courses. There should be some lucrative options so that they can completely leave the trade,” DCW chief Swati Maliwal says.
“There should be a holistic rehabilitation. They should be seen with respect and no social stigma should be attached to a sex worker. The company where they are placed should not make public her past otherwise the whole exercise will be futile. The Delhi government and the DCW are putting its head together in this regard,” she adds.
Maliwal, during the meeting also suggested that industry organisations such as Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Confederation of Indian Industry, The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry in India and PHD Chambers of Commerce should be involved to help in the rehabilitation process.
The committee, set up on the orders of Supreme Court, was reconstituted in 2012. Rishi Kant of Shakti Vahini, an NGO, which has been working closely on the rehabilitation of sex workers, says: “The problem is there is no synergy between various stakeholders such as police, anti-trafficking units, welfare department and civil society. Everyone works in isolation. On the other hand, the traffickers are a united lot and their network is very strong.
“There can be various options for rehabilitation like handing over Mother Dairy outlets to these women, giving them a small house, employing them in government canteens, etc,” he adds.