Hope for stolen childhoods

In a hard hitting play of their life stories, the rescued /escaped daughters of sex workers of Kamathipura narrate their ordeals which for them is a form of therapy
Hope for stolen childhoods

HYDERABAD:Kamathipura, one of the biggest and oldest red-light districts in Asia, sees girls lured, trafficked and sold into sex trade and the cycle continues as later their daughters are pushed into the same work. Their childhoods are stolen from them and sold off to customers: their reason for survival. At the same time there are several girl children who escape from this 18th-century British established area. Some sex workers forsake the place, try building a family but disappear to the same world leaving their daughters at the mercy of paedophile stepfathers, and it’s after much sexual abuse somehow these little girls manage to run away, find shelter in NGOs and try to gather the slivers of their shattered lives. At Kranti, a Mumbai-based NGO these girls not only try to put their lives back in shape but also attempt to heal themselves through therapy and theatre.

The stage adaptation, storyline, acting and direction is done by these 11 girls between the age of 13 to 24. Their play Lal Batti Express or Red Light Express has garnered much acclaim in India and abroad in hard hitting narratives based on their life stories. Shares a survivor 21-year-old Taniya Yadav, who came to Kranti five years ago, “When I was quite young, my mother left her work and shifted to a small house with a man. Later she went back to her old life leaving me behind with him.”

The man raped her every day. She kept on falling sick and would be beaten mercilessly black and blue. “He’d stuff clothes in my mouth and beat me. I tried several times to escape but couldn’t. I even tried to commit suicide. But one day I did run away and sat all alone on a railway station drenched in rain. I somehow managed to get the phone number of Kranti and was saved.” Later the co-founder of the NGO Robin Chaurasiya arranged sessions for her with a therapist. The survivor, who also took interest in acting shares, “Therapy and theatre are synonymous for me. My turbulent emotions get vented and I feel much relieved after every performance.”

Taniya isn’t alone, there’s Jayshree Patil, 17, preparing for her Class XII exams that she’s pursuing from NIOS. She was born in Kamathipura, but her mother wanted to settle down with the father of the girl and so they lived as a family. “But my father died when I was nine years old. My mother, who was once a Devdasi, brought another man the same day. He would beat both of us, I came to Kranti and have learnt to forgive both of them,” she shares. Now her mother has gone back to the red-light area, but she goes to over there to meet her. She adds, “I like talking to my mother. There are other aunties (sex workers) as well who are fond of me. But sometimes it’s risky for me to go there.”

At the NGO, almost all the girls go to Kamathipura to meet their mothers. Informs Bani Das the co-founder, “We never stop the girls from meeting their mothers. It’s a biological bond. These children have already suffered much. Why add more to their burden?” At the same time the organisation has its share of financial burdens, too. Adds Bani, who’s made Mumbai her home for almost two decades after she left Calcutta, “We don’t get any support from Government nor do any corporate organisations offer us any help. Whatever support we get is through crowd-funding.” That’s how it’s through this monetary channel they could go to different venues abroad for performance. They were much appreciated at Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Scotland, 2017.

They have also performed at Smock Alley Theater, Dublin; Midlands Arts Centre – MAC, Birmingham; Chicago, Salt Lake City, and Washington DC. Shares Bani, “After the girls finished the performance in Washington, an old lady came to us and just burst into tears. People often connect with the stories of the girls and the Q&A sessions post the play just get longer.”

Ask the girls about the play and their voices chirrup with joy. Says Jayshree, “In the past I have played the role of the child of a sex worker who doesn’t get admission in a school because of her mother’s profession. We ourselves write the dialogues based on our life stories. That way we get connected to one another’s pain and find a vent to release the same. It’s a healing process for me.” She goes for therapy sessions to overcome the abuse that she has gone through for years. When she feels numb during the sessions and can’t speak her therapist makes her do some physical movement. “My counsellor takes interest in the play and that’s how I connect with it more as a process of cure,” she shares, eager to be in the city where the group is performing for the first time at N Convention Center this Sunday, January 21 at 6.30 pm.

Details: https://www.facebook.com/kranti.india/
— Saima Afreen
saima@newindianexpress
@Sfreen

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