Children of sex workers try different strokes in life

NEW DELHI: Nineteen-year-old Shikha is pursuing a training course in nursing. Nothing unusual, except that she is the daughter of a sex worker. There are others like her who have broken away from the kothas of GB Road for alternative careers.
Twenty-year-old Ameeta is doing a course in fashion tailoring. She was taken out of the kotha when she was 10-year-old and has been living in a boarding school ever since."I want to work with leading fashion designers," Ameeta says. Her mother, a sex worker, suffers from TB.
These are among 150 children, the Joint Women’s Programme (JWP) rehabilitated in boarding schools and educational ashrams over the last decade. Some are as young as two to three years. And their backgrounds are kept confidential. "Many of these children suffer from trauma and if they are stigmatised by other children, their situation will get worse," says Jyotsana Chatterjee, director, JWP. The group has to depend on funding from private donors. It is also running a day creche and school on GB road.
There are younger children too like three-and-half-year-old Rita, whose mother disappeared in a police raid in 2001. The child was being brought up by other sex workers. One of them informed the Anti- Trafficking Network, a coalition of 16 NGOs including the JWP, that there were plans to sell her. "It was after much persuasion that the madam agreed to give us Rita. She was immediately placed in a boarding school outside Delhi," says Chatterjee.
Attempts are also being made to rehabilitate young boys as they too are vulnerable and sexually exploited. Over 50 boys have been placed in educational institutions so far. Twelve-year-old Deepak is determined to put his past behind him. "My mother used to lock me all night in the terrace while she entertained customers. I like studying and want to become a fighter pilot."
At any given time, says Chatterjee, there are over 2,000 children growing up in these kothas. But with funds drying up, the JWP needs new donors.