HC lifts ban on dance bars

MUMBAI: Girls clad in shimmering ghagra-cholis will once again sway to Bollywood tunes in dance bars across Maharashtra. On Wednesday the Bombay high court struck down the legislation banning dance performances in licensed eating houses, permit rooms and beer bars across the state.

What probably clinched the decision for the court was that the legislation banned all kinds of dance performances in dance bars but exempted establishments like pubs, discos, and five-star hotels.

Labelling the state’s move “unreasonable”, Justice FI Rebello and Justice Roshan Dalvi said that the discrimination between establishments defeated the purpose of the ban.

The ban was intended to prevent the exploitation of women and stop dances which are obscene, vulgar or immoral and hence derogatory to the dignity of women. “The restriction in so far as it prevents the bar owners from having the same or similar dances as in the exempted establishments and the bar dancers from performing dances, is unreasonable, not in public interest and consequently void,” the order stated.

The court also held that “If women other than dancers can work in the prohibited establishments and that does not amount to exploitation, we do not see as to why when women dance to earn their livelihood, it becomes exploitation”.

The bar dancers, however, have two months to dust their dancing shoes and catch up with the latest dance moves. The annual performance licenses of most dance bars expired on March 31 and in granting the state government time to appeal against the order, the HC said that the state need not act on renewing the licenses for a period of eight weeks.

“The HC has renewed our lease on life,” said an ecstatic Varsha Kale, president of the Bharatiya Bar Girls Union, one of the nine petitioners who challenged the Bombay Police (Amendment) Act imposing the ban. Laxmi, a eunuch who religiously attended the court hearings said, “We have come out of a disaster. The state should compensate the bar girls”.

Dancing girls, bar owners and activists waited with bated breath as the judges began pronouncing the judgement by upholding the state legislature’s competence to pass the Act. The court held that the Act did not discriminate against women, and did not violate the freedom of speech and expression and right to life. But it did discriminate against different establishments.

The court raised the question of employment of minors at dance bars.   

Noting that two studies done by Prayas and SNDT show that a small percentage of bar dancers are minors, the court asked both the NGOs to periodically make  study reports. The court asked the state government and the police to act on any findings of illegal employment or contract of minors. Quoting Mahatma Gandhi, the court said, “I hold that more helpless a creature, the more entitled it is to protection of men from the cruelty of men”. The court also recorded the statement made by bar owners’ counsel Veena Thadani that they would “never permit a single child to be abused in their premises”.

Roaring business

• Total turnover of dance bar owners alone per annum - Rs100 cr
• Average daily income of taxis servicing bar girls & customers - Rs45 lakh
• Monthly income of a dance bar girl - Rs9,000-1.5 lakh

The judgement

• The court said that by discriminating between dance bars on one hand and pubs and hotels on the other, the legislation defeats the purpose of the ban
  
• “If women other than as dancers can work in the prohibited establishments and that does not amount to exploitation, we do not see as to why when women dance to earn their livelihood, it becomes exploitation”

Look who’s happy

• Total number of dance bars in Mumbai (with and without licences)  750+
• Dance bars with valid licences (In Mumbai) 367
• Dance bars with valid licences (In the rest of Maharashtra) 125
• Approximate number of bar girls in the state 75,000+
• Approximate number of male staff employed 1,25,000+