A total of 950 sex workers along with 129 children were living in the Tangail brothel
Leaders of Sex Workers Network on Thursday demanded that the government have a long-term plan to rehabilitate the sex workers before they are evicted from any brothel in the country.
They made their demand at a press conference organised by SWN in association with Manusher Jonno Foundation at Dhaka Reporters Unity.
Chumki Begum, vice-president of Sex Workers Network, alleged that local ruling party leaders planned to evict sex workers from a 200-year-old Tangail brothel.
She informed that a total of 950 sex workers along with 129 children were living in the brothel.
Chumki also claimed that local municipality mayor Shahidur Rahman Khan Mukti led the eviction drive to grab 350 decimals of land.
Many sex workers wanted to attend the press conference, but the people who evicted them from the brothel barred them from joining the programme, she added.
Akhi Akhter, a sex worker of the brothel, told the Dhaka Tribune, “We live in an independent country. But we do not have the freedom to do just what we think.”
“Several days after eviction, we along with our children had to get involved with illegal activities juts to survive. Has the government come up with any solution to this problem?,” Parvin, another sex worker, said.
On July 14, a group of local religious leaders under the banner of ‘Anti-social Activities Resistance Committee’ evicted the sex workers from the Tangail brothel.
Earlier on July 6, the sex workers handed over a memorandum to the local mayor. Later, the committee held a meeting on July 11 and threatened to demolish the brothel if they did not leave the place willingly.
Representatives from ActionAid, ICDDRB, HASAB, UNAID, Save the Children, BLAST and ASK were present at the press conference.
Source: Dhaka tribune
