The usual scenes in the evening at Sonagachi

Mishti, a sixteen-year-old, was brought into the world of prostitution at the young age of ten. She was promised a roof over her head, clean clothes to wear and three meals a day. A trade agreement convincing enough for her parents to send her off with an unknown middle-aged man, who brought her to the narrow lanes of Sonagachi. In the past six years, she has tried to escape four times but all efforts were in vain. She could never surpass the ‘Nishiddho Pallis’ (Red Light Areas). Over time she has given up and tried to build a home out of the ten dilapidated rooms. She knew the one at the extreme end corner like the back of her hand, she knew the three spots upon which the filtered light through the curtains would fall, the constant plinks of water from the heavy seepage on the ceiling and the rhythmic yet bothersome humming noise of the fan. Years have passed by and the anger and sorrow have turned into nonchalance and acceptance. She is a reserved girl who lives by each day as asked of her, and in return, asks for just five days of happiness. Each year, from ‘Shoshti to Doshomi’ (Sixth day to Tenth day of Durga Pujo), Mishti is on leave. She puts on her white saree with red borders, a clothing item quintessential to the women of Bengal, and goes to visit nearly all Durga Pandals in North Kolkata with her 4-year old daughter, Gudiya. 

It was on one such Ashtami, as she along with her daughter reached the gates of one of the pandals, that she recognised one of her regulars in the crowd. He proceeded to exchange a few words with the authority, and she knew her profession had been revealed. But the consequent reactions of the people in charge was something she did not expect. The guards barred them from entering the pandal, and explicitly forbade them from participating in the Pujo festivities. The one thing that gave her a sense of purpose and provided her with an element of enjoyment was snatched from her within the blink of an eye. The society was taking away the one thing she loved yet again. Durga Pujo, a festival that transcends the confines of identities, and warmly embraces all in a jubilant observance of the triumph of good over evil, had been reduced to a festival that could not surpass the barriers of societal "propriety."

Durga Pujo is marked by grand celebrations and splendour and exhilarating festivities that resonate across the entire country. It remains incomplete without the reverential worship of the Navakanyas, representing various forms of Maa Durga. In numerous regions of Northern and Eastern India, young girls who have not yet reached puberty are venerated on the ninth day of the festivities. However, the true essence of Durga Pujo is most profoundly felt in Kolkata, often referred to as the cultural capital of India.

Kumortuli: Where Kumors create the Creator

The preparations for this Pujo span the entire year in Kumortuli, a traditional potters' enclave nestled in Northern Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Here, skilled artisans embark on crafting Durga Idols using bamboo, straw, husk, and Punya Mati, a mixture of mud sourced from the banks of the river Ganga, cow dung, cow urine, and mud from the doorsteps of the Navakanyas, with one of them being the Veshya.  As per the norms, mud from the courtyard of the sex workers is an integral part of the idol-making process. The mud can only be collected with the permission of the brothel owners and if they oppose, the priest cannot coerce them in any form.

The majority of the multi-storeyed brothels in Sonagachi, Kolkata, the country’s largest red-light district, were owned by zamindars back in the day. They were the chief consumers of the service provided by the Veshyas, and yet, were appalled on hearing their names in broad daylight. The Veshyas are subjected to the same form of hypocrisy even today when it comes to Durga Pujo. It is quite discernible that after providing the craftsmen with mud from their own homes, these women want to be a part of the festivities but they are forbidden from doing so because the ‘Bhadroloks and Bhadromohilas’ (Gentlefolk or people of respectable class) of the society feel that the mere presence of the Veshyas would lead to polluting the sanctity of the pandals. Since time immemorial, the sex workers have been ostracised and humiliated. They have been rejected from society and have been made to feel inferior, impure and ‘the stigmatised others’. It was in 2018 that a prominent upheaval took place on their end. The sex workers’ community protested in solidarity against the hypocrisy associated with the ritual and refused to donate even a pinch of their courtyard’s mud for the purpose of idol-making.

During this movement, Bharti De, the mentor and advisor of the Sex Workers’ Association Darbar Samonoy Committee said, “Durga’s idol is made from the clay of the sex worker’s courtyard, the event is held with their donations, but when the sex workers want to go to the Durga pandal, they are not allowed to enter. The question is that if our soil is sacred, our money is sacred, and the body consumed by so-called civilised men in the dark of the night is sacred, then why are we considered profane?"

Sex workers perform Durga Pujo organised by Durbar Mohila Shomonboe Shomiti at Sonagachi

After years of persistent efforts to gain access to the Pujo pandals, they conceived the idea of establishing their own community Pujo. Here, again, they confronted a novel challenge posed by a society rife with hypocrisy, where standards vary for each citizen, contradicting the constitutionally upheld principle of equality. In response to this discrimination and the violation of Constitutional principles, which guarantees every citizen the right to profess, practice, and propagate any religion of their choice, they filed a PIL in court. The advocates in this legal action were Mr. Arunava Ghosh, Mr. Anindya Lahiri, Ms. Pousali Banerjee, Mr. Sambuddha Dutta, and Mr. Sourav Mondal.

On September 26, 2013, a significant milestone was reached when the Calcutta High Court issued its final verdict in the case of State v. Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee. The High Court ordered the state to make the necessary arrangements for the Pujo celebrations. In rendering its judgement in favour of 'Durbar Mohila Shomonboe Shomiti,' the court referenced Article 21 and Article 25 of the Constitution, which grants the Right to Life and the Right to Worship to all, regardless of their differences. The panel of judges also remarked, 'We may love them, we may hate them. How can we ignore them when we use them the most.' 

Throughout centuries, our society has persistently attempted to stifle every dissenting voice through its entrenched misogyny and its inherent nature to deal in absolutes. However, it has proven incapable of suppressing the one of the highest degrees of crime, as the blindfold is lifted whenever a woman's modesty is outraged. The law does not grant authority to dictate religious practice; that authority lies within the shared essence coursing through all of us, and it is pure.

A large step towards empathising and trying to understand the hardships of the sex workers' lives was achieved recently in the City of Joy. A pandal dedicated to their lives was designed and put on display for people from all sects of the society to experience. The massive crowd and resonating expression on the people’s faces was a testimony to the success of the craftsmen. They had sculpted a courtesan, a maternal figure, using clay sourced from the courtyard of a woman who embodied both the roles of a courtesan and a mother. While there was a fraction of the pandal hoppers who returned home with a newly found respect for the sex workers, there were a fraction who felt that the theme exposed the new lows of secular degeneracy in the city.

A silicon Durga idol, themed ‘Parichay’, depicting the lives of sex workers by Baranagar Nawpara Dadabhai  Sangha Durga Puja  Committee

Laws have been amended to give them the respect and position they deserve in society, but have not been able to obliterate the invariable objectification, character assassination or label of an ‘inferior outcast’. Them not being allowed to enter is just a glimpse at the injustice done against them. It is one of the innumerable reflections of how majority of people alienate the marginalised groups. Hiding behind the apparent justifications of conservative traditions, community expectations or security concerns is the deeply embedded stigma of perceived moral impurity. 

This fight for inclusion and the struggle of soil is just one example of society's duplicity towards them. Countless untold narratives remain concealed within the labyrinth of Sonagachi's streets, fading away over time before they ever enter the collective consciousness of our morally ambivalent society. It is a society that has seemingly forfeited its moral compass, its capacity to discern the ethical from the unethical. The evolution of human society grew from people's need to band together and hold hands through both crisis and success, and it is this very bond that determines its journey into the future. If the current absence of mutual respect and inequality within society persists, then it will ensure that the prolonged existence of mankind will look truly grim.

~ Anushka Maiti and Priyanshu Kumar