New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday asked the West Bengal government to check if older women in South 24 Parganas were being pushed into prostitution due to the Covid pandemic.
A Bench of L Nageshwara Rao and B.R. Gavai were hearing a plea seeking benefits of sex workers in the country.
Amicus Curiae Piyush K Roy told the justices that older women from poor families, “especially after the onset of the pandemic”, were prostituting themselves in south Bengal to earn money. He referred to a news report.
The article quoted activists in Bengal’s Sundarbans as saying: “Their (the women’s) abject poverty, made worse by a pandemic that has stretched on for more than two years, have made them vulnerable to traffickers who found it difficult to procure young women and minor girls and shifted focus to middle aged women from West Bengal’s coastal regions.”
Another welfare officer told the reporter: “There is less scrutiny on older women and their vulnerability has made them accessible to traffickers.” The report stated there were grandmothers among these exploited women.
Roy told the court: “Your lordships may direct the state government to look into it. They are aware… There is no precautionary measure by the state government.”
The Bench asked the counsel of West Bengal to look into the issue and respond by 17 May.
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