Flesh trade moves from brothels to private establishment.
Abha grew up in a Mumbai slum. When she was 13, her mother sent her to a neighbour's house to borrow money. Before handing over the cash, the neighbour - a local pimp -convinced her to try Ecstasy and once the child got intoxicated, she coaxed her into having sex with a customer. When Abha came back to her senses, the pimp threatened to tell her mother what she'd done unless the child agreed to return. Soon Abha began selling her body on a regular basis, frequenting up to three private residences a day to feed her drug addiction. Unlike in a brothel, Abha wasn't physically restrained, she could come and go, but drugs and blackmail were her shackles.
Abha's story shines a light on the changing nature of the flesh trade in Mumbai, which has become more covert functioning out of lodges, hotels and private residences rather than brothels in red light districts. To gauge the number of minors in this private network, International Justice Mission (IJM) recently surveyed 43 unique locations as part of a study titled `Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Mumbai'. They encountered 214 sex workers of whom 25 (11.7%) were minors. In comparison only 5.5% of the 10,082 women encountered in public establishments were below 18.
Anti-trafficking agencies first noticed the shift from public to private in 2011. "Earlier, you could walk into Kamathipura and buy any girl no matter the age," says IJM's Regional Director of North India Sanjay Macwan, "but now, that's not the case." Today, one needs to have a contact and build a relationship with that contact before procuring a minor for sex. For instance, IJM's researchers were tasked with reaching out to the same contact up to five times before accepting a refusal. Usually, the first contact, after much coaxing, would simply provide the number of another pimp, who again had to be approached multiple times before he put them in touch with another lead. As soon as a contact showed the researcher a minor, either in person or over WhatsApp, all communication was stopped.
The size of this network came to light when the Bombay high court asked the Mumbai police to investigate 500 numbers gleaned from online escort agency ads. In a short time, they connected those 500 numbers to 16,000 people. During the course of this study, different leads showed IJM researchers the same girl proving that networks overlap. "We realized that many pimps have access to the same girl so traffickers are bringing them to a common pool," explained Macwan.
Researchers also noticed that girls in the private network were picked to blend into their surroundings. For instance, sex workers in upmarket Andheri or Versova residential complexes were more sophisticated than their peers working out of a lodge in Mira Road. They were also better educated, spoke English and wore less makeup so as to avoid attracting attention. Often, neighbours and security guards had no idea what was going on behind closed doors. In one instance that was not part of the study, police raided a posh private residence to find a family pimping out their 17-year-old daughter and her friend.
Most clients access these private networks through escort services advertised in newspapers and on websites.The numbers mentioned in these classified ads are often hard to trace--traffickers make use of the fact that the number registered on WhatsApp can be different from one's actual number--and the initial point of contact is never the one supplying minors. This ensures that even if those on the periphery are arrested, the kingpins remain safe.
These private networks sprouted up as a response to the crackdown on the trafficking of minors by law enforcement agencies. "It's now well known in the sex industry that if you sell minors, you will definitely go to jail," explains Macwan. The added risk has led to a jump in price of minors--the range in private establishments is from Rs 3,000-15,000, while clients in public establishments pay just Rs 250-2,000.
IJM's researchers are certain they've just scratched the surface and the authorities need to investigate further before the absolute scope of the network can be ascertained. However, the good news is that the rescue of a single girl can topple multiple networks because, as the study showed, they all overlap. Abha, for instance, was rescued by IJM in 2015. Since she frequented multiple private establishments, she was able to identify many traffickers, leading to the subsequent arrest of 12 pimps.
Link :
http://m.timesofindia.com/city/mumb...tial-complexes-study/articleshow/59406895.cms
Date of publication : 02 July 17
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