by Saiam Hasan
NEW DELHI, Nov. 22 (UPI) -- Kiran is a 21-year-old university student living in the Badapur area of South Delhi. Her father is a plumber with a family of six. They think that she is a factory employee.
They dont know about her work in the sex trade.
“I have joined this profession to support my family financially and my studies,” she said.
She said she averages almost 4,000 rupees ($86) per month, about one-fifth of the International Labor Organizations worldwide estimate for sex workers. Nevertheless, she said she would stay in the trade to pay for a good education for her younger brothers.
In India, as elsewhere, poverty and financial constraints compel girls like Kiran to join the profession. They live in slums and mostly range in age from 20 to 40. Some endure the business for decades.
Urvashi Gandhi of Education at Breakthrough, a nongovernmental organization working for human rights, said poverty and patriarchy are the main reasons that propel young girls into the profession.
“This cannot be stopped," Gandhi said, "until and unless we are able to overcome these social evils.”
Priyanka Sarkar with another NGO, Poorest Areas Civil Society, said the solution will not come soon.
“The problem lies in our social structure itself," Sarkar said. "We need at least 50 years more to overcome these problems and find solutions.”
But for many in the profession, solutions wont come soon enough.
Neha, a 36-year-old sex worker and pimp, has been in the profession for six years. The South Delhi resident has been ostracized by her community. The neighbors have stopped the water connection to her two-story house, and her children have stopped going to school. The safety of the family has become a major concern.
Rajani, 45, another sex worker, like Kiran has learned to hide her activities.
“My family threw me out after they came to know that I was a sex worker," she said. "Now I have remarried but my husband doesn’t know how I make a living."
Unlike some European counterparts, Indian sex workers have no governmental protection for health or safety. Faced with nothing but social ostracism, most see no way out.
Yet Rajani still can hope.
This story has been published by United Press International.
