From “Veshyas” to “Entertainment Workers”: Evolving Discourses of Bodies, Rights, and Prostitution in India

Abstract

The discursive terrain of prostitution has undergone several changes with modernity/postmodernity. Various groups of feminists hold contentious, often conflicting, ideologies on this issue. Two broad groups emerge from these debates: One takes a clear abolitionist perspective, while the other takes a sex work position. Both these groups actively lobby and join forces with individuals and institutions to influence global and national policy‐making. There is a great degree of variation and overlap within and across each camp. Among those taking a sex work position, some argue that selling sex is equal to using any other part of the body for making a living. This article examines the discursive terrain of prostitution in India, focusing on what it means to treat sex as any other use of the body in commerce. It concludes that prohibition is a prejudice that India must overcome to develop sound public health policies.

Sex worker activism, feminist discourse and HIV in Bangladesh

“…This argument has been criticised by anti-sex-work feminists on the grounds that sex work involves the sale of embodied sexual services. What in situations such as rape and abuse may be considered as sexual harassment, in the case of sex work is regarded as normal (Kole 2009 ).…”

WhatsApp and Cell Phones Among Sex Workers in India: The Impact of ICT in the Banaras Red-Light District

“…As has been observed, numerous risks to women’s health and violence from police, pimps, traffickers, and customers are related to sex work (Barnard, 2003; Kole, 2009). In the red-light district of Shivdaspur, the sex workers we interviewed and listened to in the focus groups testified to a perception of vulnerability and precariousness due to the constant threat of police raids and the risk of ending up in prison.…”

“… 2. While the concept of “social vulnerability” is increasingly applied to extraordinary crisis contexts for populations facing sudden risks such as natural catastrophes, we mean vulnerability as an ordinary condition experienced by a community exposed to high probability (or even daily) risks. For example, risks to women’s health and violence (from police, pimps, traffickers, and customers) associated with prostitution (Barnard, 2003; Kole, 2009). We also understand vulnerability as a condition manifesting itself permanently on victims (criminalization, stigma, social precariousness, lower income, high illiteracy), questioning the sense of continuity of existence and the personal identity of the people exposed to it. …”

Experiencing Vulnerability, Abuse and Deception: Why Women in Sylhet City of Bangladesh Enter into Prostitution

“…Once a girl involves herself in prostitution, she cannot come out of it due to different socioeconomic and psychological reasons. The prostitutes are stigmatized as fallen or unchaste because of which they always feel that society will not accept them even after quitting prostitution (Kole, 2009;Tahmina & Moral, 2004). In Bangladesh however, the prostitutes are not allowed to be buried or cremated, rather their dead body is floated down in a river or left to be decomposed on a remote shoal (Hammond, 2008;Tahmina & Moral, 2004).…”

“…Prostitution in Indian sub-continent became institutionalized during the period of British colonial rule, and has been continuing (Kole, 2009;Mukherjea, 2006;Tahmina & Moral, 2004). Once a woman gets involved in it, she eventually finds herself 'caught up' in the vicious trap of multiple socioeconomic and psychological factors, hardly gets any opportunity to come back because of the societal stigma that awaits her (Biraj, 2012;Tahmina & Moral, 2004;Valandra, 2007).…”