Full report (pdf) - People's Union for Civil Liberties

More documents

Recommendations

Info

provocative slogans and placards used by theagitators such as “Nanna Deha NannaHakku” (My body, my right) . This resultedin a section of the public taking matters intotheir own hands and assaulting theprotesters. When this happened the policedid their best to control the situation in thecourse of which some people might havebeen injured.On being questioned as to how they wereunable to control what was in effect an attackon unarmed and non-violent protesters andmaintain law and order which was theirprimary responsibility. On being asked whythey failed to ensure that women were notprotected from assault and serious hurt, Mr.Halesh Naik’s only response was to say thatpolice aggressively act to control situations,sometimes there is inaction by the police andsometimes mistakes happen as police arealso human beings.Response of TV9The team could not meet Nagaraj, thereporter of TV9 but was able to speak to himover the phone. When we asked him abouthow did he get the information about theraid, Mr. Nagaraj said that day he had beento the town and he received a phone callfrom some villager who said that there is araid going on in Shettarahalli. Thereby hethought it would be interesting to go andtake some photographs. He said since he wastoo far from the place of the incident, hethought he would directly capture on filmthe arrested persons in the police station.When he was questioned as to who allowedhim to go inside the station to film, he saidpolice themselves gave permission to enterthe station, along with his cameraequipment. When he was asked as to howhe could telecast the faces in the newswithout blanking out the faces of the(women), the reporter agreed that it was alapse on his side and it had happenedaccidentally and it was not intentional.This was corroborated by Somashekhar,news editor of the Bangalore desk of TV9 ,who admitted that though it is theestablished policy of their channel to blankout the faces of women and children whoare accused in a criminal incident, the policywas violated in this instance because of themistake of their copy editor, working underpressure of deadlines. Somashekhar said thatthe copy editor was reprimanded.Response of KHPT10The team also decided to meet those whowere funding Suraksha’s HIV/AIDS efforts ,i.e. the Karnataka Health Promotion Trust(KHPT).Our team expressed its concern to officials ofKHPT about the confidential informationcontained in the Sex Workers Register aboutsex workers and their clients, including theirHIV status, maintained by NGOs likeSuraksha, which work on HIV and AIDS .KHPT requires the agencies it funds tocollect such information, but in the event ofthis confidential information being disclosedto the public, vulnerable women, especiallysex workers in rural areas, would be put toextreme risk. KHPT needs to be concernedabout the human rights implications of suchunauthorized disclosure.Ms. Vandana Gurnani, director of KHPT,clarified that the Sex Workers Register is partof an individualized monitoring system (inaggregate and in individualized form) that isessentially designed “to reach the lastwoman” in an intervention campaign. Such
information reaches KHPT in coded form,and KHPT does not share this data with anyindividual or agency. Ms. ParinitaBhattacharjee added that this information iscollected only with the consent of the sexworker. However, it was evident that thisconsent was not an informed one, with thesex workers being unaware of the fullrepercussions of such information falling intowrong hands. Ms. Parinita conceded that inthe aftermath of the Suraksha case, there is aneed to standardize information collectionsystems to prevent recurrence of suchpotential misuse of sensitive information.ConclusionsAfter listening to the testimonies of thosewho were arrested on the 02.06.07 as well asthose who were beaten on 03.06.07 as well asthe version of the police, the media andKHPT officials with respect to the twoincidents we have come to the followingconclusions:1. The police have not understood theletter and spirit of the ITPA. The act ismeant to target trafficking and inparticular brothel keepers and thosewho live off the earnings of prostitutionof another person. In the facts of thepresent case as per the police case itselfthere is nothing to indicate that all thewomen arrested are either living off theearnings of the prostitution of anotherperson or that they are running abrothel. There is also a misapprehensionof the very understanding ofprostitution under the ITPA. The ITPAafter its 1986 amendment under Sec 2 (f)understands prostitution as, ‘ the sexualexploitation or abuse of persons forcommercial purposes and the expressionprostitute shall be construedaccordingly.’ The definition has beenchanged from Section 2(f) of the 1956Act , which understood prostitution as ,‘the act of a female offering her body forpromiscuous sexual intercourse for hire,whether in money or kind and whetheroffered immediately or otherwise andthe expression prostitute shall beconstrued accordingly.’ The crux of thechange in definition of prostitution isthat it is meant to criminalize only thoseactivities where there is sexualexploitation or abuse for commercialpurposes. If such a relationship is notpresent, regardless of the nature ofpublic opinion or perception of morality,the police have no business conductingany arrest. This conclusion is furtherbuttressed by a circular issued by theDGP Karnataka State which reiteratesthe point that Sec 3,4,5, and 6 are meantto be used against traffickers, pimpsand other agents and facilitators ofcommercial sexual exploitation ofwomen and children (see Annexure I).Very similar circulars have been issuedby the DGP’s of Tamil Nadu andAndhra Pradesh (see Annexures II andIII). There is also an emerging academicopinion which supports the aboveconclusion. Jacob Punnose the Addl DGof Police, Kerala has noted, ’There arewide differences between moralprecepts on one hand and socialprejudice and enacted law on the otherhand. Being a prostitute is not anoffence as per law but being a prostituteis considered immoral...The law todaypermits the woman to sell privately andthe man to buy it. It prohibits a thirdparty from making money out of it.‘ (seeAnnexure IV).2. To ensure safeguards, the ITPA underSec 15 mandates that when persons arearrested under the ITPA, the SpecialPolice Officer or Trafficking PoliceOfficer may make a search without awarrant only in the presence of tworespectable inhabitants of the localityone of whom shall be a woman.However in the case of the arrests madeon 02.06.07, there was neither a Special11
Page 1 and 2: Policing Morality in ChannapatnaA P
Page 3 and 4: IntroductionThe series of disturbin
Page 5 and 6: Following the raid the Probationary
Page 7 and 8: There was media coverage with headl
Page 9: and as we boarded the tempo to take
Page 13 and 14: RecommendationsTo the state1. The B
Page 15 and 16: Annexure 1...ctd15
Page 17 and 18: Annexure 317
Page 29 and 30: www.pucl.orgPeople’s Union of Civ

Full report (pdf) - People's Union for Civil Liberties

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?