Papers Presented
Speaker Upholds Sex Workers’ Dignity in Parliament
Sex workers across the country welcomed the timely intervention of the Honourable Speaker of the Lok Sabha Ms Sumitra Mahajan, to uphold the right of sex workers to approach the Ministry of Women and Child to discuss a proposed legislation that will have a tremendously adverse impact on their lives…
BLURS AND BLIND SPOTS : THE NEED FOR SOCIAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF WOMEN IN SEXWORK
There is a large blind spot in our vision of the world of women in work. While the world has only very recently, and that too grudgingly accepted the contribution of women to agriculture and to the domestic work sector, there is another group of women whose turnover never gets into the statistics…
SEXUALITY, COMMERCE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Human rights of sexworkers are routinely violated by mainstream society. This is a field reality. It is well known and acknowledged that the police do not register cases of crimes against sexworkers. Crimes against them go unpunished. Often the rowdy elements and constables have free sex with them under threat…
COOPERATION OR CONFRONTATION? A CRITIQUE OF GO-NGO COLLABORATION IN HIV PREVENTION
Many countries have realized the potential of women in sexwork and sexworkers to work effectively against the spread of STD/HIV/AIDS. Very reluctantly, even our country has. All those countries that have faced the issue squarely without mincing words and policies have progressed…
HIV/AIDS INTERVENTION AND EMPOWERMENT AMONG SEXWORKERS IN ANDHRA PRADESH:WINS’ EXPERIENCE
CCACS (Chennai corporation AIDS control society) consulted WINS to draft a theme paper on challenges faced in practicing safe sex behavior. (2002). The HIV virus brought in its wake a whole lot of uncomfortable and inconvenient questions on sex, sexuality, morality, gender and gender discrimination…
Rights and Wrongs
I am twenty three years old. I am my parents only child: my mother during her more dejected moods is fond of saying I am a kind of handicap. I was married by the time I was fourteen. Six months into my marriage, I found out that my husband was positive.I was carrying. I was very young: Just fifteen years…
MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS: FUTURE CHALLENGES AND THE ROLE OF UNIVERSITIES
Dear people, at the outset I want to tell you how thrilled I am today to be standing before you with an opportunity to air my views in front of such an august gathering. I ask your indulgence even before I begin, because what I am going to put before you is without malice to any persons, caste, creed, belief, faith, orientation or political inclination…
NATIONAL NETWORK OF SEX WORKERS [NNSW] ME AND MY WORLD – AP NETWORK - WOMEN’S INITIATIVES (WINS)
The National Network of Sex Workers (NNSW), India is a network of sex worker-led organizations and allies committed to promoting human rights of sex workers in India. NNSW consists of CBOs / State Networks/ State Federations/ Collectives and NGOs across seven states of India with a membership of more than 50,000 female, male and transgender people in sex work.
PEER BASED INTERVENTION FOR STD/HIV/AIDS PREVENTION AMONG SEXWORKERS
‘WINS’ started to optimize the participation of women in prostitution to increase their perception of risk to self and to empower them in the process. The community must respond to the epidemic because the women from these communities are affected more.After three years of interacting and educating the community of sex workers, a group of women were able to come together and form a society. It was registered with the registrar of societies in the year 1996…
POSITION PAPER ON RESCUE & REHABILITION
Women in sex work are from various parts of the country, from various castes and communities. In many communities sex work is a family occupation. From time to time the courts in India have taken spasmodic notice of instances of prostitution and have initiated action through the police to eradicate such “undesirable occupation” and rescue and rehabilitate minor girls in sex work
Strategic defects in countering an epidemic of a sexually transmitted infection
In the 17 years from the first case of AIDS, the US, European nations, Australia and New Zealand have “somehow” managed to bring down infection rates while the African and the Asian countries are still struggling to find their feet. This would broadly seem to be true…
ISSUES OF SEX WORKERS IN THE TIMES OF COVID – NATIONAL NETWORK OF SEX WORKERS [NNSW ]
Sex work is defined as the provision of sexual services for monetary benefit or kind. A conservative estimate of female sex workers in India is 1.2 million with an estimated 6,88751 “registered” female sex workers were receiving services from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Providing sexual services is the sole means of livelihood for them. As their work does not enjoy social sanction as do other forms of work, sex workers are forced to struggle…
WOMEN AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Five decades ago there was an adaptation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and much later in the Vienna UN conference it was openly proclaimed that “Women’s Rights are Human Rights”. Years after all this, the average woman still stands alone, struggling to avoid the stomping that she continues to be subjected to. Human Rights infringements haunt her from birth to her death and after