New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday directed all the states to conduct survey to assess the living conditions of sex workers and submit a report in the apex court within 12 weeks.
A bench comprising of Justice B R Gavai and Justice C T Ravikumar issued the direction during the hearing of a plea filed by Budhadev Karmaskar regarding conditions conducive to sex workers to live with dignity as per Article 21. In its earlier hearing it had sought report from states regarding rehabilitation of sex workers but except West Bengal no other state filed it.
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The court was informed today that as per the court's directions sex workers can not be detained but they are kept in jail and nobody is even allowed to meet them. In response to this the court ordered a survey by the states to verify the claims.
The Bench also sought to know the position of the bill regarding the matter from the Government but there was no clear status about its progress. "You can't play with the orders of the bench. You make a statement that you will share the bill with them(petitioner) in two weeks or we call the cabinet secretary to the court. We are in the era of transparency. What is the harm of sharing the bill with them," said the court. The case will come up for hearing again after 12 weeks.
In this case, the court had ordered earlier this year that irrespective of profession, sex workers are also entitled to live with dignity and that the police should not abuse them physically or verbally.
