Police sting ends career of prostitution kingpin
29 May 2008, 0553 hrs IST,TNN
CHENNAI: The anti-vice squad (AVS), a wing of the city police, has arrested Mohan alias Mohan Reddy (43), the kingpin of a prostitution racket operating out of Valasaravakkam and Virugambakkam in the city. Reddy, whose illegal network stretched across the four southern states, was caught in a sting operation at Koyambedu when he supplied a woman to a police decoy. According to sources, Reddy, a film distributor, engaged thousands of woman — some of them film actresses and junior artists — and ran brothels in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. The AVS team also rescued two AP woman and seized an Indica car (TN 01 V 1643), a Bajaj motorbike (TN 10 M 4210) and a few high-end mobile phones from Reddy. "He had been supplying actresses and young women to VIPs for over five years. There are many prostitution cases pending against him, including two with the AVS. He was absconding for some time and we caught him using a decoy on Tuesday," AVS inspector Udhayakumar told TOI. Udhayakumar said Reddy even used his own house on Ist Main Road in Alwar Tiru Nagar as a brothel. Reddy charged between Rs 5,000 and a few lakh rupees for the woman he supplied, sources said. "He mostly brought woman from Andhra Pradesh. He has distributed films and has close connections with both Tollywood and Kollywood. We have information regarding his connection with many actresses," the AVS inspector said. After the arrest of the pimp Kannada Prasad in Feb, 2007, Mohan Reddy was the second big target of the AVS. "Reddy is also a high-end pimp, who used all sorts of methods to lure woman into prostitution. Both men had good connection with the film world and supplied actresses to preferred customers. Both were able to supply woman in any southern state by just making a few phone calls," another police official said. The police is now tracking Reddy's network of brothels. The pimp was produced before a magistrate and remanded in judicial custody

Girls sold as helps for Rs 2,000 in capital, one held
23 Jul 2008, 0303 hrs IST, Medha Chaturvedi,TNN
NEW DELHI: On Tuesday, a 25-year-old man was arrested by the IP Estate police on charges of trafficking young girls from tribal areas of Jharkhand to Delhi, luring them with promises of well-paying jobs. Accused Bhim reportedly supplied girls to a placement agency dealing in domestic helps in Shakurpur where he sold them for as little as Rs 2000. The agency, Birsa Bhagwan Tribal Society of India, registered under the Societies Act as an NGO, doubled as a placement agency and was allegedly involved in trafficking girls from Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Orissa. The racket came to light when the mother of one of the girls Bhim had taken, a 10-year-old from a village in Jharkhand, never heard from her daughter after sending her to Delhi to work three years ago. The girl's mother approached Bachpan Bachao Aayog, which put her through to CWC which initiated the process of tracing the girl. "When we saw that police in Ranchi were not taking any action on our complaint, we followed Bhim to Delhi when he came to pick up another girl. We reached the Shakurpur placement agency and found that on the ground floor, they were running an NGO and the first floor was an apartment turned into a placement agency. We found several young girls there who had been promised jobs, but where they actually ended up, nobody knew. There were no proper records of the girls either," said Naresh Sengar, national secretary, Bachpan Bachao Aayog. He added that the 10-year-old girl they were looking for could not be traced in the records. "We had seven other women who had come with us to look for their respective children. All returned empty-handed," said Sengar. According to a police official, Bhim was arrested and charged with trafficking minors and abduction. He revealed the name of his accomplice, one Munni, who was now absconding. The owner of the placement agency and his brother were also arrested. Sengar alleged that the children were traded and trafficked like commodities and the "current rates" were around Rs 4,000 per child. "They are promised salaries of Rs 10,000 a month as lures. But the children end up either in the flesh trade or as domestic helps at salaries as low as Rs 1,200 a month. They are not paid for months on end, so that they don't leave. CWC helped us nab the criminals and thus we were able to rescue the children. However, search for the other children are still on," said Sengar.

Grim reality: A survey of sex workers
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Grim reality: A survey of sex workers
21 Jul 2008, 0204 hrs IST, Abantika Ghosh,TNN
These are shocking statistics that belie the close to 10% growth rate of the national economy and tell the story of a community that isn't. As per the law.
More than 41% women sex workers in the Capital's GB Road enter the profession because of sheer poverty, 39% of their own free will. Only 50% use condoms and the social welfare department says despite their best efforts health and hygiene standards cannot be improved too much beyond the occasional anonymous checks by mobile vans as the law does not recognise the existence of these women.
All the anti-trafficking laws notwithstanding, almost the entire population of GB Road comprises women, who have come from other states, Andhra Pradesh topping the list with 28.7% sex workers hailing from that state. These are the findings of a first-of-its-kind survey of Delhi's sex workers done by the Delhi Commission for Women.
The study - 400 commercial sex workers from G B Road were studied and inputs were also taken from the rescued women in government homes even if their numbers were not included in the sample size - aimed at a need assessment of Delhi's sex workers and their children and also to draw up a demographic and health profile of the neglected community in order to draw up a comprehensive policy for prevention of trafficking and incidence of HIV-AIDS.
The study found that the work is mainly conducted through the kotha malkins who pockets a large percentage of the income so that for an average sex worker the monthly income is quite low, 72.5% earn between Rs 3,000-5,000 and 20.7% earn more than Rs 5,000.
State social welfare minister Yoganand Shastri said: "The study which is the first of its kind, will help us get a perspective on the extent of the problem and formulate policies accordingly. But there are inherent dichotomies in the system that make things difficult.
For one, it is only when a woman rescued and taken to Nirmal Chhaya that we can really help them because the law does not recognise the profession at all. We do undertake surreptitious checks with the MITWA mobile vans, but that does not always suffice."
Commenting about the low condom usage and dismal awareness about STDs (less than 50% know about them and 46.5% are infected), Shastri said: "The Delhi State Aids Control Society (DSACS) had put up condom vending machines in all major houses in the area and they are kept well-supplied. Unless the legal constraints go there is not much more that we can do about it."
A whopping 57.5% of respondents admitted to substance abuse with smoking being the most popular one, followed by alcohol, heroin and marijuana. 23.7% complained of exploitation, 54.4% of them held the police responsible.
Interestingly, more than 85% of these women have some sort of identity proof like ration card, voter I-card or even passport which they procure with help from cops. While more than 60% of women surveyed have children, only 40% of them go to school, a figure that commission officials say bodes ill for the objective of preventing second generation entry into the profession