Sex works and call girl. - sanasaleem’s blog

"I keep a mobile phone for the family and one for the clients," said Renuka Kala, a late-decade sex worker living in the Sangli district of south Maharashtra and a VAMP worker . The two phones are a curious metaphor for his dual life. To conceal her identity as a street sex worker, she told her family that she worked odd jobs or did housework.

Renuka was one of 20 sex workers at the VAMP drop-in center in the Shanti-Red Red Light district of Miraj, 11 km from Sangli town, among whom most were uneducated and spoke Marathi or Kannada or both. They hold on to their mobile phones - Nokia models, cheap feature phones and touchscreen Android phones from Indian brands. The nature of the mobile phone business has changed, they said.

Street-based sex workers such as Renuka run all businesses on the phone. Clients arrange their visit after confirming the availability of sex workers via mobile phone. Sex workers communicate easily with outbound clients and their owners (literally meaning "masters", often regular clients who have graduated among lovers) without fear of eye contact. Being seamlessly connected helps build client relationships, so to speak. “When I go out of town, my clients call and ask,‘ How long are you going to stay there? Come back, ”said the frightened Bharati on the blanket. They share their joys and sorrows with their lovers on the phone; Conversations are not always about sex.

Sex workers come back at the time of the problem within the mobile phone. Another colleague, Sureka Power, said, "We inform each other when there are police raids on brothels and gather in front of the police superintendent's office to demand the immediate release of our colleagues." HIV + person meetings, drug collection, dispensary visits, dealing with violent clients or lovers - sex workers organize and coordinate numerous organization activities over the phone.

The mobile number has been carefully shared, as it is a trade-off between convenience and exposing oneself to harassment. The numbers are only given to regular customers and those who pay well. “Men call us and laugh, talk obscenely, ask disgusting questions about our bodies, look at us and threaten sexual harassment or torture on us. We threatened to return the abuses and report them to the police. If it increases, we switch the phone for a day, ”said Maya, who lives and works in a nearby brothel. Like most women, they often seek the help of a trusted man - a regular customer, family member or malak - to deal with harassment. There is also the fear of surveillance. Kiran Deshmukh, VAMP's community coordinator, said, "My Malak committed a murder in 1995. Mobile phones were not common then. If I then contacted him by any phone, I was involved in the next legal investigation.

Most sex workers received their mobile phones as gifts from their malacs or clients, so that they could stay in touch and avoid the hassle of using pay-phones. Some, like Sureka, bought used phones, often for loans. Their boyfriends and clients also teach them how to use the phone. Since they cannot read or write, contacts are listed in their phonebooks as emoticons, single characters, and special characters. Sureka grabbed her phone and showed Katrina Kaif a mug shot with a phone number. Images like pictures of Bollywood actors are added to the contacts so that they can identify the caller. Often a different ringtone is set so that the number of malacs differs from one another. Through audio and visual signals, they transmit and receive files via Bluetooth and MMS, take photos and perform tasks such as playing music and games.

Those who live in parallel outside the harbor of the sex trade keep two phones or dual-SIM phones to separate their confidential identities as sex workers. Those who practiced sex in public said they did not feel the need to separate their personal and professional lives. Instead, they kept two phones or two SIM cards in trouble.