Gujarat village girls engaged as young as seven to escape sex trade

In Vadia village, 200 km from Ahmedabad in Gujarat's Banaskantha district, families are arranging formal engagements for girls as young as seven to 12 to keep them out of the intergenerational flesh trade, both Hindustan Times and Times Now report based on a PTI story. For generations, women of the nomadic tribe village have been forced into sex work while men acted as agents, queuing on the Palanpur Tharad highway daily to solicit truck drivers and passers-by.

A 19-year-old nursing student, whose mother and grandmother are both sex workers, was engaged at 11 and married at 18. 'My mother decided that she will not let me be pushed into this,' she told PTI on condition of anonymity. Villagers follow an unwritten code: engaged or married girls are not pushed into prostitution. A glimmer of change came in 2012 with the first mass marriage ceremony organised by NGOs, and such ceremonies now happen every year.

Mittal Patel, founder of the NGO Vicharta Samuday Samarthan Manch, said persuading 90 of 160 families to give up the trade has been difficult but has stopped several girls from forced prostitution. Despite the government allotting agricultural land in 1963, lack of irrigation forced many women into sex work. Chandra Sarania, forced into prostitution at 15, got her daughter engaged at 12 and married at 18, paying Re 1 to confirm the engagement.