Prostitution : Should It be Legalised in India? - An Essay

This essay has been written by Mohit Gandhi.

Prostitution is considered to be a victimless crime, a necessary evil. However, would legalising this oldest profession of the world help the victims in any way? Proponents of legalizing prostitution believe that it would decriminalize the trade, improve public health, increase tax revenue of the government, get streets cleaned by getting prostitutes off the streets, end child prostitution and further, allow consenting adults to make their own choices.

Yet, when one considers the countries where prostitution has been legalised, it has actually led to exploitation of minor girls and women and further, commodification of women. People often don’t realize that legalisation means decriminalization of the whole industry, not just the women in it, thus making the men who buy women for sexual activity as legitimate consumers of sex and the pimps as legitimate businessmen. Legalisation would also facilitate in promoting sex trafficking, as has happened in Netherlands and Germany once the prostitution was legalised. Further, it would not protect either the women in prostitution or their health. A legalized system often mandates health checks and certification, but it is normally for women involved and not the male buyers, thus pointing out the duplicity of the policy as it is the male buyers who originally transmit disease to the women they purchase. Women who actually enter the field of prostitution do so under certain social pressures, better termed as survival strategies, i.e., it is the last choice for any women to feed her or her children, and legalization would actually make this a viable career choice for women from poorer regions of the country.

Further, legalization of sex trade would send an unethical message to the new generations of men and boys that women are sexual commodities and that prostitution is harmless fun. Men who earlier would not have risked buying women for sex would now see prostitution as acceptable.

Sex trade is not something on which any government would be proud of and Supreme Court of India in Budhadev Karmaskar vs State of West Bengal & Ors has stated that it is a slur on the dignity of women and government would not facilitate, assist or create conducive environment to carry on flesh trade, instead the efforts would be for rehabilitation of sex workers. In Netherlands, since the prostitution was legalised, one finds women of all ages and races, dressed in hardly anything, are put on display in the notorious windows of brothels and sex clubs, thus expanding the sex trade.

There is hardly any evidence that legalization of prostitution makes things better for women in prostitution, instead it actually makes things better for the government and the sex industry, both of which enjoy increased revenues. Sweden has acknowledged that prostitution is a form of male violence against women and children, and the purchase of sexual services is criminalized; this has resulted in massive decline in street prostitution. Thus, instead of legalizing the prostitution, governments should respond to the male violence and sexual exploitation of women in prostitution by legally addressing the demand for prostitution.