Overview of the legality and practice of prostitution in India
Legal status of prostitution across Asia.
Prostitution legal and regulated
Prostitution (the exchange of sex for money) legal, but organized activities such as brothels and pimping are illegal; prostitution is not regulated
Prostitution illegal
No data
Prostitution is legal in India,[1] but a number of related activities including soliciting, kerb crawling, owning or managing a brothel, prostitution in a hotel,[2] child prostitution, pimping and pandering[3] are illegal.[4][5] There are, however, many brothels illegally operating in Indian cities including Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Pune, and Nagpur, among others.[6][7][8] UNAIDS estimate there were 657,829 prostitutes in the country as of 2016.[9] Other unofficial estimates have calculated India has roughly 3 million prostitutes.[10][11] India is widely regarded as having one of the world's largest commercial sex industry.[12][13][14][15] It has emerged as a global hub of sex tourism, attracting sex tourists from wealthy countries.[15][13][16][17] The sex industry in India is a multi-billion dollar one, and one of the fastest growing.[18][19][20]
^"The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956". wcd.nic.in. Archived from the original on 2 May 2015. Retrieved 28 November 2015.
^"Section 7 in The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956". indiankanoon.org. Retrieved 28 November 2015.
^"2008 Human Rights Reports: India". U.S. Department of State. 25 February 2009. Archived from the original on 26 February 2009. Retrieved 28 November 2015.
^"India court raises question of legalising prostitution". BBC News. 10 December 2009.
^"Sex Work Law - Countries". Sexuality, Poverty and Law. Retrieved 31 March 2018.
^Cite error: The named reference zee was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
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^Magdalena Rojas (12 June 2016). "In Kamathipura's lanes, legalisation of prostitution seems like a faraway debate". firstpost.com. Retrieved 20 October 2016.
^"Sex workers: Population size estimate - Number, 2016". www.aidsinfoonline.org. UNAIDS. Archived from the original on 4 June 2019. Retrieved 21 July 2018.
^"How Many Prostitutes Are in the United States and the Rest of the World?". Prostitution.procon.org. Retrieved 7 November 2021.
^Friedman, R.I. India’s shame: Sexual slavery and political corruption are leading to an AIDS catastrophe. Trends Organ Crim 3, 60–62 (1998). doi:10.1007/s12117-998-1059-x
^Dalla, Rochelle L.; Kreimer, Lee M. (13 October 2016). ""After Your Honor is Gone…": Exploration of Developmental Trajectories and Life Experiences of Women Working in Mumbai's Red-Light Brothel Districts". Sexuality & Culture. 21 (1): 163–186. doi:10.1007/s12119-016-9388-4. ISSN 1095-5143. S2CID 146803616.
^ abChattopadhyay, Amit; McKaig, Rosemary G. (2004). "Social Development of Commercial Sex Workers in India: An Essential Step in HIV/AIDS Prevention". AIDS Patient Care and STDs. 18 (3): 159–168. doi:10.1089/108729104322994847. PMID 15104876.
^Prabha Kotiswaran (2011). Dangerous Sex, Invisible Labor: Sex Work and the Law in India. Princeton University Press. pp. 250–350. doi:10.1515/9781400838769. ISBN 978-1-400-83876-9.
^ abHuda, S. (2006). "Trafficking, Sex-Trafficking, HIV, AIDS, South Asia". International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics. Sex trafficking in South Asia. 94 (3): 374–381. doi:10.1016/j.ijgo.2006.04.027. PMID 16846602. S2CID 557597.
^Joffres, C., Mills, E., Joffres, M. et al. Sexual slavery without borders: trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation in India. Int J Equity Health 7, 22 (2008). doi:10.1186/1475-9276-7-22
^Boruah, Jayanta and Baruah, Masia, Legal Implications of Sex Tourism (3 April 2021). Journal on Jurisprudential Studies Vol 1 Issue 3, Forthcoming, SSRN 3818710
^Kole, Subir K. (2009). "From "Veshyas" to "Entertainment Workers": Evolving Discourses of Bodies, Rights, and Prostitution in India". Asian Politics & Policy. 1 (2): 255–281. doi:10.1111/j.1943-0787.2009.01115.x.
^Biswajit Ghosh (2009). "Trafficking in women and children in India: nature, dimensions and strategies for prevention". The International Journal of Human Rights. 13 (5). Routledge: 716–738. doi:10.1080/13642980802533109. S2CID 145131069.
^Irani Machado da Silva and Anuradha Sathiyaseelan (2019). Luca Cerniglia (ed.). "Emotional needs of women post-rescue from sex trafficking in India". Cogent Psychology. 6 (1). Cogent OA: 1631584. doi:10.1080/23311908.2019.1631584. S2CID 197700400.
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