The color of Indian call
girls By Siddharth Srivastava
NEW DELHI - Indian authorities have recently
unearthed several call girl rackets involving
white-skinned girls in the capital, as well as the
commercial hub of Mumbai. As huge pockets of India
globalize at a rapid pace, bringing in overnight wealth,
the economics of demand and supply have resulted in the
importing of young girls, who obviously come at a higher
price, to meet the typical Indian fetish for fair skin.
A comment termed it as the reverse outsourcing of call
girls being brought in to meet the requirements of the
beneficiaries of the actual business process outsourcing
surge.
Police say the girls are being flown in
on tourist visas from countries such as Uzbekistan (one
of the poorest nations of the world), Azerbaijan and
Russia, all of which have fallen on hard times because
of the state of their lagging economies. In keeping with
the increased permissiveness that comes with lavish
lifestyles, over the past couple of years India has
witnessed thousands of massage parlors mushrooming in
several metropolitan cities as another front to supply
girls, whether Indian or foreign. But, as the money gets
better, girls are being sought from across continents.
The circle is only likely to get bigger, with reports of
several cases wherein "agents" are known to establish
communication with international porn sites to seek out
particular "stars" that a client might fancy.
Typically, prostitution in India has involved
mostly women forced into it due to penury. The majority
of these women come from states such as Sikkim, Uttar
Pradesh, West Bengal and Bihar, where poverty levels are
among the worst in the country. Others are transported
illegally from neighboring Nepal and Bhutan, in what is
considered to be one of the most organized yet brutal
operations involving the trafficking of humans. These
women occupy the red light areas of GB road in Delhi or
Sona Gachi in Kolkata or Kamatipura in Mumbai, living in
inhuman conditions, susceptible to HIV and other
sexually transmitted diseases. They cater to a clientele
usually belonging to lower middle class professions such
as truck drivers, laborers and policemen. A recent
Bollywood release titled Chameli starred top
actress Kareena Kapoor doing a Pretty Woman a-la
Julia Roberts, all very glamorous on screen, but much
more bleak in real life.
The latest police
findings, however, tell a different story of
prostitution changing with the times. The racket is
increasingly turning high-class with several Heidi
Fleiss clones in existence. As the amount of money that
is being pumped in by the client increases, so is the
availability of women cutting across continents. The
police have revealed an elaborate communication network
that is in place to transact the deals through the use
of email. The pimp is no longer a seedy creature such as
an auto rickshaw driver, taxi driver or a petty
shopkeeper hanging around dark street-corners trying to
cut deals with potential customers. Today, the pimp is
an "agent", usually driving a car of a foreign make and
communicating on a cell phone. In some cases they have
turned out to be executives in private sector firms,
especially in the hospitality sector.
"As far as
catering to a rich clientele is concerned there has been
involvement of Russian girls struck by economic
re-structuring in the erstwhile Soviet Union. Indian
girls from colleges and middle class backgrounds,
aspiring models also sometimes look to make a fast buck
through this route," says deputy commissioner of police
(crime) Dependra Pathak, who has been spearheading the
police investigations in New Delhi, "It is, however, for
the first time that it has been found that such a wide
international network has been laid. It is a reflection
of the money-power that is in play."
Earlier
this month, police unmasked the kingpin of prostitution,
referred to as "professor", whose operations extended
from Southeast Asia, central Asian countries, the Middle
East and Europe, with his business empire valued at over
US$4 million. Professor is the owner of several hotels
in the Old Delhi area where most of the girls are housed
and supplied to clients who usually check into five-star
hotels. The liaising with the girls is done on the
Internet, with clients seeking their photographs or
websites and fixing a price before-hand. The list of
customers is kept confidential with the photographs of
the girls forwarded to the clients before the actual
meeting. In order to establish a wide database of girls
across the world, communication has been established
with several porn websites that further liaise with the
girls to either meet up with Indian clients in India or
some foreign destination.
The police have
managed to draw a profile of some of the girls arrested
over the past few months. While the usual rates for
Indian' girls range from $10 to $50, "white skinned"
foreign girls can charge as much as $300 to $1,000 for
one night, excluding hotel stay, travel and other
expenditures. For girls from Central Asian Republics,
the money is needed to tide over problems back home such
as looking after children or aged parents, given the
lack of employment opportunities. Some of these girls
are qualified as secretaries, teachers, doctors and even
psychiatrists. One of the women arrested in a raid in
Mumbai, Irina Guzairova, turned out to be a doctor in
speech therapy. Most arrive here on travel visas, make
money and move back once the period is over and come
back again after a gap.
For long in India there
have been prominent voices seeking to legalize
prostitution as sex-workers are considered the most
vulnerable to HIV. It is estimated that the number of
HIV positive Indians could jump from 4 million today to
25 million by 2010. Prostitution is illegal, yet a
flourishing business with estimates putting the number
of sex-workers in India at approximately 2 million
generating an income of over $1.5 billion a year, most
of which is garnered by agents and pimps.
The
argument to legalize prostitution is to see the issue as
a reality that is impossible to eliminate. Hence, it is
better to provide an institutional framework in order to
humanize the status of women as well as monitor health
care. But, as things stand, according to the Immoral
Traffic Prevention Act, 1986, "any sexual intercourse
outside socially acceptable unions is regarded as
prostitution. Procuring, inducing or taking persons for
the purpose of prostitution is punishable with rigorous
imprisonment of at least three years, but not more than
seven years, and a fine of $45."
Thus, for now
it's the women who face the brunt of the system -
exploited by pimps, agents, customers, police and jail
authorities.
Siddharth Srivastava is a
New Delhi-based journalist
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Apr 20, 2004
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