Supreme Court panel to study plight of sex workers

In an attempt to make the life of sex workers and their children better, the Supreme Court has set up a committee to examine the problems being faced by them in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai.

“The problem of sex workers is more acute and on a larger scale in these metropolitan cities,’’ a bench of justices Markandey Katju and Ms Gyan Sudha Misra said and asked the Centre, all states and Union Territories to assist the panel in carrying out a survey regarding prevention of trafficking, rehabilitation of sex workers who wish to leave the work, and conditions conducive for those who wish to “continue working as sex workers with dignity”.

The five-member non-governmental panel will be headed by Pradip Ghosh, a lawyer. The others on the panel include Jayant Bhushan, lawyer; Usha Multipurpose Co-operative Society; Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee and; Roshni Academy founded by Ms. Saima Hasan.

This order was passed while hearing an appeal filed by Budhadev Karmaskar of Kolkata who had killed a sex worker. Upholding the life sentence to Karmaskar, the court treated the matter as a PIL.
Unprotected sex is one of the major reasons for HIV and AIDS and some sex workers have said they are forced to provide sex without condom.

The court said sex worker are forced to indulge in the profession not for “pleasure but because of abject poverty”.

“If such a woman is granted opportunity to avail of some technical or vocational training, she would be able to earn her livelihood instead of selling her body,” the court observed.