Prostitution is the oldest profession known to man, and it is not explicitly illegal in India; a number of related activities such as soliciting, kerb crawling, owning or managing a brothel, prostitution in a hotel, child prostitution, pimping and pandering are illegal. The Bombay High Court in September 2020 had ordered the immediate release of three sex workers detained at a state corrective institute in Mumbai stating that prostitution was not a criminal offence under the law, and that an adult woman had the right to choose her vocation. The bench of Justice Prithviraj Chavan had said that prostitution had not been considered a criminal offence under the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956.
Prostitution in India has evolved in two distinct directions. There are the red light districts and high end escorts who operate out of 5-star hotels, having well-off clientele. The class divide is apparent in the prostitution industry. The cost of labour varies with the environment. There is no standardisation of the service. It has diversified to cater to the growing needs of the male population, customising offerings from the sex workers and employing technology to ease the search for specific requirements. No matter what the social standing of the sex workers are, most of them are forced into this profession with no social security, medical benefits or compensatory benefits that usually come with employment. They work on the margins of our society and are denied the legal considerations that every other channel of employment enjoys.
There are multiple websites on the Internet which offer escort services to guests in 5-star hotels popularly coined as ‘in -calls’. In Chennai, these websites put up profiles of young girls usually in the age range of 21 to 24 with visual descriptions of how they pleasure their clients. These descriptions extend for multiple paragraphs and contain licentious imagery to rile up the reader. Some profiles also offer airport pick ups, ‘all day girlfriend’ and the assurance that the young girl has been trained to accompany the elite clientele to social gatherings to exude an image that the services need not be restrained to physical consummations. On skimming through multiple such websites, one will realise that there is a pool of 5-6 phone numbers which are being repeated. The escort racket is essentially being controlled by a close circuit of pimps who put up pictures of different girls but repeat the same phone number. This casts serious doubts on the veracity of the pictures. It can be conjectured that most of these pictures have been stolen from Facebook and Instagram profiles of women who are not connected to this trade.
Once a number mentioned on the website is contacted through WhatsApp, the pimp sends pictures of 4-5 women skimpily dressed and the remuneration they will charge for different hours of service. An advance to ‘book’ the woman and the hotel address in Chennai for the ‘in-call’ are asked for on chat. The condition that the ‘in-call’ will only take place at a 5-star hotel is also mentioned. The pimp provides Gpay, Phonepay and other payment gateway information for the client to transfer the booking amount. It is also mentioned that once the booking amount is received, the escort will call the client herself to get further information about hotel room number, special services desired by the client and the timing of the meeting. On contacting the different numbers available on the different websites, a similar modus operandi came into the picture.
There have been many instances reported across social media and newspapers that once this booking amount is transferred, the other party starts extracting money from the account as they have access to the relevant account information. In case the extortion becomes difficult electronically, the other party starts demanding for more money with the threat that they will go public with the transaction details, the client’s desire to employ sex workers and the chats. They even threaten the clients that they will leak the chats in their employment and social circles, hammering a blow in their carefully fabricated social networks and standing. Out of fear of harassment and social ostracisation, the client succumbs to the demands of the extortionists.
The hotel staff and the managers are aware of the activities that unfold in the closed spaces. The entire concept of escort services for the well-off clientele can be looked at from two perspectives. In providing services out of their own volition, women sex workers are making a conscious decision. Every human being has the freedom to choose their own trade, and modern society has passed the need for sexual morality or a moral compass for occupational choices. If a woman is offering services that include her body, out of her own will to lead a better life and to improve her standard of living, then condemnation is insular. In such cases, society as a whole should contribute towards building a safe working environment for them, bringing their trade under permissible laws, employing working conditions for their benefit, dismantling patriarchal biases and ensuring legal redressal of their grievances.
However, socialist discourses of feminism looks at sex work as essentially exploitative in nature. A lot of sex work directly stems from human trafficking which has a cascading effect on the physiological stability of the workers involved in this trade. Sex work involves violence against women and even if there is consent, the consent has been built on a status quo of oppression towards women. The consent is built on extreme poverty, lack of opportunity or past traumatic events. It is considered to be the last option for women and a direct contradiction to free choice and is a systematic pattern of sexual exploitation and violence that is meted out to vulnerable children, women, and LGBTQ+ persons with the aim of profiteering by the pimps who control the trade. Sex work is inherently patriarchal in nature where the male client controls the working conditions, requirements and the consequent action. The sex worker relinquishes any position of power in this exchange. So even if a woman is willingly offering her body for sexual service, there is an inherent power struggle that lands the women at the oppressed position. In most cases, this willingness is born out of fear of what might happen if they try to leave prostitution. The legal stakeholders who buttress these discourses, aim to abolish the practices through penalising the seller and the buyer rather than the sold. They believe curbing demand by eliminating the buyers is the most effective way to combat prostitution, also known as the Nordic Model or the Sex Buyers Law.
(cover image courtesy: time.com)
Comments