BENGALURU: The Supreme Court recognized sex work as a profession on May 19, 2022, and issued a slew of directions to uphold the dignity of sex workers. However, they continue to be harassed, with little to no medical intervention by the government, forcing them to persist in shelter homes with no proper schemes to support the community.
Geeta M, who works for Sadhana Mahila Sangha, an NGO that supports street-based sex workers in Karnataka said, “Sex workers are still harassed by police personnel and left in shelter homes, deprived of their right to work and live in dignity.” Geeta stressed that police conduct illegal raids in lodges, thereby not allowing them to perform sex work, putting them at greater risk to earn from unsafe places.
Experts advocate a gradual change in public consciousness towards the community. “The social stigma needs to be uprooted, and the government is responsible for taking initiatives,” said Ananth Kamath, Assistant Professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) and co-author of Urban Undesirables, which addresses problems faced by street sex workers in Bengaluru.
Sex workers include females as well as transgenders. Rakshitha M, a transgender activist with the NGO Ondede asked, “The new government promised five guarantees, why are transgenders and trans sex workers not included in those? The least we can expect is proper medical kits for HIV-positive sex workers, good quality condoms and subsidised healthcare.”
“HIV-positive patients in government hospitals are not given nutritious food, the tests for cervical and uterus cancer are so expensive that these workers have no money to avail them,” Geeta said. Government hospitals neither offer proper counselling nor spread awareness about diseases such as AIDS and STDs, she added.
Mental Health Ignored
Dr Neethi P, senior researcher, Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS), and co-author of Urban Undesirables, said, “We have policies for rescue and rehabilitation of sex workers, but mental health remains neglected.”She added that sex workers are often exploited at work, but police pay no heed to their plight. Dr Neethi emphasized the need to examine mental health issues of the profession.