India’s prostitution villages _ DW Documentary
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00:00Rajkumari is waiting for customers at the roadside.
00:09She has a young baby to feed at home and a family to support.
00:13So far, no luck.
00:18Rajkumari is one of the hundreds of thousands of Indian women in institutionalized sex work
00:24in a practice with roots in the age-old caste system.
00:42Just three hours away from India's capital New Delhi is a starkly different world.
00:47I am travelling to a cluster of villages known for sex work.
00:51This is Ghegoli, a village in the district of Alwar in the state of Rajasthan.
00:59Here I meet Ankita, who is a sex worker.
01:03At her request, we have changed her name.
01:08She says she is of legal age, but doesn't look it.
01:12Ankita is getting ready for a client.
01:15Her clients include men from nearby villages, truck drivers or migrant workers that pass
01:21through on the highways and young men with disposable incomes.
01:26She joined the profession three years ago and says it was by choice as it enables her
01:32to support her family.
01:33I know from my father that my aunt also worked like this.
01:38I got into this field due to poverty.
01:44How much are you earning at the moment?
01:47Around 60 to 70,000 rupees per month, around 750 euros.
01:52Apart from me, no one in my family can find work.
01:55We were starving.
01:56We need a roof over our heads.
01:58We need to build a house and my sister needs to get married.
02:02Do you have any debt?
02:05I paid it all off.
02:07How much was it?
02:08About 11,000 euros.
02:10Oh, that's a lot.
02:12Did you pay that back?
02:13Yes, everything.
02:15Within two years?
02:16Yes, within two years.
02:22Having to borrow money traps many families here in a vicious cycle.
02:27Banks do not lend money since they do not consider sex work as work.
02:32So these families turn to local lenders who charge exorbitant interest rates, making them
02:38even poorer.
02:40Rachna, we also changed her real name, is the eldest of a total of seven siblings.
02:47Due to high debt, she also has to work as a prostitute like her mother and her aunt.
02:54I was 15 when I understood what it was all about.
02:58And at the same time, it became more and more clear to me how poor we are.
03:04So I got in.
03:05What was the situation?
03:10My little siblings always had to beg for food.
03:13We have no real house, no land, nothing.
03:17At some point, the money that my mother earned here as a sex worker didn't suffice.
03:22So she had to go to Mumbai.
03:26In hotels you can earn more.
03:29She had to leave us alone to do so.
03:35It became clear to me that it was the only way to make money, and essentially for us
03:40to survive.
03:42One day I finally said to her, I don't want you to do this.
03:46I will take care of this.
03:47I am now the breadwinner of the family.
03:52Rachna went to Mumbai through an agent who recruited her by contacting local pimps in
03:57an elaborate sex trade network.
04:00There are an estimated 3 million sex workers in India between ages 15 and 35.
04:08Sex work is legal in India.
04:10Pimping and human trafficking are not.
04:13This is a matter of survival for many like Rachna.
04:17They are abused in the system but stay for lack of any other avenues of work.
04:24When I was very young, I had a client in Mumbai who treated me horribly.
04:33He wouldn't even pay me.
04:36Instead, he beat me black and blue and even stole my clothes.
04:44I ran after him but couldn't take them back.
04:49It was extremely humiliating.
05:01There is a stigma attached to these villages, as the people here belong to the bottom of
05:05the caste hierarchy.
05:07Nuts, bediya, banchara and kanjar, where these women come from, have traditionally been nomadic
05:15tribes.
05:16They move from place to place, they are scattered all over.
05:20But many are in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.
05:33Before the women were driven into sex work, these ethnic groups worked mainly as performers,
05:38dancers, jugglers, acrobats and magicians.
05:43Because of their work and way of life, the British colonial power viewed these ethnic
05:48groups as a threat.
05:51In 1871, they were criminalised under the Criminal Tribes Act, which was only repealed
05:57at the time of India's independence.
06:02Stereotypes about these tribes still persist in society and makes it almost impossible
06:07for them to start other professions or means of livelihood.
06:16I went to meet male members of a family from the community.
06:25There's a lot of discrimination.
06:27No one wants to give us decent jobs.
06:30That would mean we could climb up and out of our misery.
06:33People don't want that, so there's no change.
06:42How do you determine that?
06:43How is this noticeable in everyday life?
06:52They won't even stand or walk next to us because we belong to a low caste.
06:57They tell us to go away.
07:00But it's getting better as more and more of us push to go to school.
07:07Otherwise they wouldn't let us come near their homes.
07:13In school, nobody would sit next to me.
07:15I wouldn't even show my ID card, fearing retaliation and humiliation because of our caste.
07:22Some children here don't know who their father is.
07:25Of course, the mother's customers don't give names.
07:28But this is a problem.
07:30Because in many places, you can only be officially registered with your father's name.
07:35So these kids fall through the cracks.
07:39But women have been able to challenge some gender roles by becoming the primary breadwinner.
07:46Those who make money are strong.
07:48Our women are strong.
07:50They support the family.
07:52They call the shots.
07:58The women are ahead of us here.
08:00They are immensely respected.
08:04These women are able to bring income to the families, build properties and make homes.
08:10They can pay off family debts, which not many women in India can do.
08:15Some eventually leave the village and move to the country's major urban centers, to Delhi,
08:20Mumbai or Calcutta.
08:21Some even as far as Dubai.
08:25Husbands, fathers and brothers of the sex workers are involved in enabling this trade
08:30and contributing to the family economy.
08:33They act as pimps, but also do house chores and raise children.
08:44But there are women who are completely on their own.
08:47This can be difficult, especially when they get older.
08:50Snehalata only had one daughter, who also worked as a sex worker.
08:55Then she died, probably from a sexually transmitted disease.
09:01I don't have any other kids.
09:03She died.
09:04She got very ill.
09:10Most of the women we spoke to would like to move on from this life.
09:14Ankita dreams of marriage when she is done helping her family.
09:22Rachana does everything to give her child a decent education, which she hopes would
09:27weigh her way to freedom.
09:33However, something is slowly changing in the villages.
09:40I meet Guddu Nagar, a teacher who is supported by an NGO working to end sex work.
09:50Today's lesson is about grammar.
09:53He believes a good education will help the women find safer ways of employment.
10:21Sex has already worked for a few families.
10:23One girl even managed to get into the police force in Jaipur, the nearest major city.
10:31Another family has several children in medical professions.
10:35One boy is a lab technician, two girls are studying, one is going to become a doctor.
10:41In these families, no woman works as a sex worker.
10:51Guddu Nagar belongs to the same tribes.
10:53His relatives were in the sex trade too.
10:57He wanted to break the cycle.
10:59He started by teaching himself to read and write, and then his relatives.
11:12Our nomadic way of life was one of the reasons it was too difficult for us to escape our
11:16misery.
11:17I have four brothers, none of whom went to school, and some of my sisters are still illiterate.
11:22I was lucky.
11:24After I had taught myself a few things, a social worker from an NGO helped me.
11:28Today, I have an official degree and can work as a teacher.
11:38There are stories like this, but few and far between.
11:42Members of the community are trying to change the destiny of the next generation.
11:52I'm Nancy, and I want to be an air hostess one day.
11:56Why an air hostess?
11:59It's my dream.
12:00Because you want to fly?
12:04Yes.
12:08A desperate hope is simmering that through education and knowing their rights, these
12:14women can leave the shackles of the past.