After a fight with her mother, R. left her home near Kolkata, one of India’s largest cities. At a train station, she met some men who tricked her and took her to a red-light district in the city. “They were laying a trap for me,” she said. Many girls who are trafficked in their teens spend the rest of their lives in brothels. R. was rescued before she was sold to one. “I just got lucky,” she said. She was sent to a shelter called Sneha run by Sanlaap, a nonprofit that prepares victims to rebuild their lives.
Anjali was 16 when she became involved with a man who enticed her to run away from her home in Siliguri, a city in India’s West Bengal state, with the promise of marriage. Instead, he and an accomplice sold her to a brothel in Mahishadal, near Haldia, an industrial town. She was forced to have sex up to 20 times a day until she was rescued. For a year and a half, she lived at Sneha among girls she said understood her anguish. Now an adult, she’s living at home with her mother, who would like her to marry, but Anjali vows not to fall in love again. “I feel extremely lonely,” she said. “I miss my friends at the shelter.”
When she was 12, S. left her home in Narayanganj, Bangladesh, with a family acquaintance who promised to find her a job in Dhaka. She was handed over to a man who smuggled her into the Indian state of West Bengal which shares a long porous border with Bangladesh. From West Bengal she was taken to a brothel in Mumbai and sold. S. was enslaved for two years before police freed her and sent her to a shelter. Six months later she met a woman who said she’d take S. back to Bangladesh but instead sold her to a brothel in Namkhana, a small town in West Bengal. After she was rescued again, S. has been staying at a shelter and waiting for her repatriation.
M., who is now 18, waits for a train with her cousin in South 24 Parganas, a largely poor district in West Bengal with a high incidence of trafficking. A man M. met in a class sold her to a brothel in Delhi. She managed to call her father and was rescued by police with help from a nonprofit called Shakti Vahini. “This incident is a dark episode in my life,” M. said. “When I came home, I was scared and ashamed. But I am not afraid anymore.”
A crowd in Kolkata celebrates Durga Puja, West Bengal’s most popular religious festival. Observed over nine days, the festival draws revellers into the streets. The holiday provides a chance for girls to mingle freely with boys. Traffickers are known to use the cover of these crowds and the relaxed atmosphere to identify and trap potential victims. They mostly befriend girls from outside Kolkata who come to the city to enjoy the sights and sound with the goal of selling them to brothels across India.
Girls walk home from school in South 24 Parganas. For many girls in rural India, education ends before high school, which often costs money. Poor families are more likely to put money toward education for boys and wedding expenses for girls. Although child marriage is illegal, it’s still widely practiced. In this region, with high rates of child sex trafficking, families also worry that girls are at risk on long commutes to school.
A West Bengal police boat patrols the Hooghly River in the Sundarbans, a watery area with dense mangrove forests that straddles the southern India-Bangladesh border. The Indian state of West Bengal shares a long border with Bangladesh which includes many unguarded stretches, allowing traffickers to smuggle girls into the country. Traffickers often use rivers to avoid detection when smuggling girls into India.
S. and N. athome in Khulna, Bangladesh.At 14, their daughter Sayedawas trafficked to abrothel in Mahishadalby a boy she’d met at adance school. For threeyears, she was forcedto perform sex workat all hours. Sayeda wasrescued and sent toa shelter in West Bengal, India. Shewas preparing to returnhome to Bangladesh when she died from a liver problem caused by excessive drinking at the brothel.
Girls paint their nails at a shelter in South 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India. Having shared similar traumatic experiences being trafficked and sold into sexual slavery, many of them forge strong relationships with one another as they prepare to return to their families and communities.
Sisters Z. and B. were trafficked by their aunt when they were in their early teens from Dhaka, Bangladesh to a brothel in Mahishadal, West Bengal. B. got pregnant at 15 and was forced to have an abortion. She often refused to have sex with customers; when she wouldn’t, the owner would make her sister whip her with a belt. “This was the most painful,” Z. said, worse than having to have sex with 20 clients a day.
C., who was trafficked as a teenager is comforted by her mother just days after being rescued and reunited with her family in South 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India. From passages in her diary, the family realized she’d eloped with a man she’d met. Months later, police found her in a brothel in Pune, a city in the western region of India. "I never thought I would be able to get out of that place," C. said. After going through the traumatic experience of sexual slavery, most girls find it difficult to adapt the life they once had. Girls during this transition period experience high rates of depression, anxiety, PTSD, self-harm, and even suicidal tendencies.
C.’s diary offers a glimpse into the teenager’s infatuation, which the man who trafficked her exploited. Her words in Bengali say: “If I don’t get you in my life, I will die. If I am not yours, I can’t be anyone else’s.”C., was trafficked as a teenager from South 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India. From passages in her diary, the family realized she’d eloped with a man she’d met. Months later, police found her in a brothel in Pune, a city in the western region of India. "I never thought I would be able to get out of that place," C. said. After going through the traumatic experience of sexual slavery, most girls find it difficult to adapt the life they once had. Girls during this transition period experience high rates of depression, anxiety, PTSD, self-harm, and even suicidal tendencies.
Shiuli, a 27-year-old sex worker, arranges to meet a client in the Kalighat red-light district of Kolkata, India. “A girl born to a poor family,” she said, “has to go through hell throughout her entire life.” Married at 13, Shiuli eventually left her abusive husband, taking their son with her, but her parents wouldn’t let her return home. She narrowly averted being trafficked. Unable to make enough as a maid, she became a sex worker. She has two other sons, fathered by clients.
Chhobi Das became a sex worker to help support her family. Although at 50 she’s too old for the trade, she has no choice but to continue living in the Kalighat district. Former sex workers often transition into other roles at brothels, such as cleaning and cooking. Some become brothel managers and even brothel owners.
Sex workers and staff members attend the annual anniversary event of New Light on December 1, which coincides with World AIDS Day. New Light, a nonprofit based in the red light district of Kalighat in Kolkata, India offers care and schooling for the children of sex workers. It also collaborates with the union that represents them to prevent brothels in the area from forcing children into prostitution.