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Flesh trade most in Maharashtra, least in Delhi

Maharashtra has the largest number of female sex workers, a recent survey by a Delhi-based voluntary organisation reveals.

The second on the list is West Bengal, while Delhi accounts for the smallest number of prostitutes -- only 3,500.

In industrially-rich Maharashtra, the number of female sex workers is as high as 350,000, while in West Bengal it is 275,000, according to the Bharatiya Patita Uddhar Sabha.

Presenting its findings to the second national conference on sex workers that concluded in Calcutta on Tuesday, the BPUS demanded that the Centre and state governments set up separate departments under the social welfare ministry to deal with the problems of sex workers.

It demanded that prostitution be legalised and licences issued to the 2.4 million-odd sex workers in India. "Unless sex workers are treated as workers, prostitution would become a serious problem in the near future," officials warn.

BPUS president Khairati Lal Bhola, while presenting the report based on surveys conducted during 1990 and 1995, called upon the government to legalise the profession immediately. He said licences should be issued only to those sex workers living in khotas and not to the khota malkeens (house owners).

He said Ujjain was the only place in India where sex workers have been given licences. The prostitutes there display these in their rooms.

The problem has assumed greater dimensions in recent years with many minor girls falling prey to sexual exploitation because of the 'clandestine nature' of the sex industry, Bhola said.

According to the BPUS report, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh each have 250,000 female sex workers, Rajasthan 270,000, Gujarat 250,000, Uttar Pradesh 180,000, Bihar 150,000, Madhya Pradesh 150,000, Tamil Nadu 130,000, Goa 5,000, Orissa 40,000 and Assam 60,000.

About 1,100 redlight areas have been identified in the country with a total of 275,000 kothas. In Delhi, about 3,500 prostitutes live in 96 kothas, along with their 4,500 children. In Bombay alone, there are about 14 redlight areas, populated by 200,000 prostitutes and their children.

According to a Central Advisory Committee report, Delhi receives prostitutes from 70 districts in the country, Bombay from 40, Bangalore from 17, Calcutta from 11 and Hyderabad from three. This indicated that there is considerable mobility among prostitutes and that there is an organised wheel of trafficking.

The two-day seminar was organised by the Calcutta-based Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee.

UNI

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