How can it be proper that Bombay (its men and economy) takes maximum advantage of poor women driven to prostitution and then dump them as soon as they are seen as hazards?
Acting on instructions from the Bombay High Court, police on 5 February raided some of the city´s brothels. Four hundred and fifty-six girls were rounded up, among them 218 Nepalis. Since there is no law against prostitution in India, it is customary to deal with the problem by sending the sex workers back to their home regions, once apprehended. This time, as a large number of Nepalis were also involved, the Maharashtra government notified the Centre, which in turn asked Nepal to take in the Nepali girls. But Kathmandu has been in no hurry to comply and the impasse continues, even as two of the girls have died, presumably through AIDS complications.
The Bombay High Court was well within its rights when it ordered the police action under the Suppression of Immoral Traffic of Women and Girls Act. But it was no moral indignation that motivated the justices. What spurred them was the disclosure by a daily paper that upto 65 percent of Bombay´s prostitutes may be HIV-positive. Their solution was simple: send them back to where they came from. Case closed.
Besides the questionable ethics of such a move, how could the learned jurists be oblivious of the wider danger of sending the hapless girls home? If the metropolis of Bombay feels threatened by their presence, what would be the repercussions on the rural areas from where a great majority of these girls come? And how can it be proper that Bombay (its men and economy) takes maximum advantage of poor women driven to prostitution, and then dumps them the moment they are seen as hazards? No one has bothered to ask that question, least of all the Nepali government.