InBengali,Sona Gachi means 'Tree of Gold'. According to legend, during the early days of Calcutta the area was the den of a notoriousdacoit by the name of Sanaullah, who lived here with his mother. On his death, the grieving woman is said to have heard a voice coming from their hut, saying, "Mother, don't cry. I have become aGazi", and so the legend of Sona Gazi started. The mother built amosque in memory of her son, although it fell into disrepair. The Sona Gazi was converted into Sonagachi.[6]
The Sonagachi project is a sex workers' cooperative that operates in the area and empowers sex workers to insist oncondom use and to stand up against abuse. Run by theDurbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, it was founded by public health scientistSmarajit Jana in 1992 but is now largely run by the prostitutes themselves. While some are crediting the DMSC with keeping a relatively low rate of HIV infection amongprostitutes, around 5.17% of the 13,000 prostitutes in Sonagachi are estimated to be HIV positive.[7] This rate is close to the average HIV rate for female prostitutes in India, which is estimated to be 5.1%, though the HIV infection rate among prostitutes as well as among the general population varies widely by region in India.[8] According to some sources, prostitutes from Sonagachi who test HIV positive are not told about the results, and live with the disease without knowing about it "because the DMSC is worried that HIV positive women will be ostracized."[9] Some prostitutes in Sonagachi have stated that "the clients, at least three quarters of them" refuse to use condoms and "if we force them to use the condom, they will just go next door. There are so many women working here, and in the end, everyone is prepared to work without protection for fear of losing trade."[9]
Besides the Sonagachi project, the DMSC also runs several similar projects inWest Bengal, organizing some 65,000 prostitutes and their children. The organization lobbies for the recognition ofsex workers' rights and full legalization, runs literacy and vocational programs, and providesmicro loans.[10][11] The DMSC hosted India's first national convention of sex workers on 14 November 1997 in Kolkata, titled 'Sex Work is Real Work: We Demand Workers Rights'.[12] The bookHalf the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide reports investigations revealing that, contrary to stated policy, the DMSC allowssex slavery,sex trafficking, and underage girls in Sonagachi project brothels.[13]
Popular culture
The documentaryBorn into Brothels: Calcutta's Red Light Kids won theOscar forbest documentary award in2005.[14] It depicts the lives of children born to prostitutes in Sonagachi.Born into Brothels takes the viewer beyond the well-known prostitute-clogged streets and into the homes of the children who live in the so-called worst place on earth. If the film has one success story, it is the discovery of ten-year-old Avijit whose natural affinity for creating exciting compositions through the lens earned him an invitation to theWorld Press Photo Foundation inAmsterdam.
On the one hand lies Sonagachi, on the otherChowringhee
This world is double-faced
There is also a documentary titledTales of The Night Fairies by Prof. Shohini Ghosh and Dr. Sabeena Ghadioke from Asia's leading Media instituteAJK, Mass Communication Research Centre, about the Sonagachi area. It has won the Jeevika Award for the best documentary feature on livelihood in India.[15]
Popular actorKamal Haasan's movieMahanadhi has a storyline based on the area. The Malayalam FilmCalcutta News depicts the story of women being trafficked and forced to become sex workers in Sonagachi.[16]
In his documentaryThe Five Obstructions, renowned Danish filmmakerLars von Trier asks poet and experimental filmmakerJorgen Leth to name the worst place in the world he has ever visited, and immediately Leth responds with "The Red Light District of Calcutta."
^Satarupa Dasgupta (2019). "Participation as a Health Communication Strategy in HIV/AIDS Intervention Projects: an Examination of a Project Targeting Commercial Sex Workers in India".Atlantic Journal of Communication.27 (2).Routledge:139–151.doi:10.1080/15456870.2019.1574535.S2CID150465047.
^Dasgupta Satarupa (2021). "Violence in Commercial Sex Work: A Case Study on the Impact of Violence Among Commercial Female Sex Workers in India and Strategies to Combat Violence".Violence Against Women.27 (15–16):3056–73.doi:10.1177/1077801220969881.PMID33263505.
Dutta, Debolina, and Oishik Sircar. “Notes on Unlearning: Our Feminisms, Their Childhoods.” In Feminism and the Politics of Childhood: Friends or Foes?, edited by Rachel Rosen and Katherine Twamley, 83–90.UCL Press, 2018.doi:10.2307/j.ctt21c4t9k.11
Wright, Andrea. “‘The Immoral Traffic in Women’: Regulating Indian Emigration to the Persian Gulf.” In Borders and Mobility in South Asia and Beyond, edited by Reece Jones and Md. Azmeary Ferdoush, 145–66.Amsterdam University Press, 2018.doi:10.2307/j.ctv513ckq.10
Newman Peter A (2003). "Reflections on Sonagachi: An Empowerment-Based HIV-Preventive Intervention for Female Sex Workers in West Bengal, India".Women's Studies Quarterly.31 (1/2):168–79.JSTOR40004560.
Cornish Flora, Banerjee Riddhi (2013). "How Do Relationships Between Peer Educators and Sex Workers Lead to Increased Condom Use?: A Social Capital Interpretation of the Sonagachi Project".Indian Anthropologist.43 (1):51–64.JSTOR41920141.
Jana S, Basu I, Rotheram-Borus MJ, Newman PA (2004). "The Sonagachi Project: a sustainable community intervention program".AIDS Educ Prev.16 (5):405–14.doi:10.1521/aeap.16.5.405.48734.PMID15491952.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link).
Nag, Moni. “Sex Workers in Sonagachi: Pioneers of a Revolution.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 40, no. 49, Economic and Political Weekly, 2005, pp. 5151–56,JSTOR4417483.
GHOSE, TOORJO. “Politicizing Political Society: Mobilization among Sex Workers in Sonagachi, India.” South Asian Feminisms, edited by ANIA LOOMBA and RITTY A. LUKOSE,Duke University Press, 2012, pp. 285–305,doi:10.2307/j.ctv11g96jz.16.
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