Rekha is a 27-year-old mother in Patna who makes ends meet by being a sex worker. She was married at the age of 11 to an autorickshaw driver, 30 then, who first abused her and then forced her into the flesh trade to supplement his income. She has been through an ordeal since those early days with medical intervention being required every now and then. Yet, today, she not only continues in the same business but has pushed her 15-year-old daughter also to follow in her footsteps.

That may be a sordid story but one that has become common enough in Bihar. While other industries may have failed miserably in the state, flesh trade has grown unabated, almost on a par with that in other metros like Kolkata, Mumbai and Delhi.

Poor financial conditions and the onslaught of western cultural influences through television and the Internet are being blamed as the main factors behind the rise in prostitution. Champa Devi, a resident of Kankarbagh in Patna, for instance, runs a clandestine cartel wherein 250 girls are on offer. "It is from the money that I earn from this profession that I have been able to solemnize the marriage of my five daughters," she says with a sense of pride.

Elsewhere in the city, Guria, 18, whose husband abandoned her after her pregnancy has taken to prostitution to support herself and her medical requirements. "I don't want to do it but I have no choice," she laments.

Significantly, cyber cafes, beauty parlours and restaurants make for a ripe meeting ground in the flesh trade. The more glamourous the place, the higher the rate that is demanded. Meenakchi Swaraj, secretary of JANHIT, an NGO, says, "The police raid such places only when they don't get their haftas. The Government must take firm action."

Undeniably, sex has become an orgainsed business in Patna over the years. As a sex-worker grows older and the demand for her services declines, she is promoted as a Chaudharain or madam. These madams laiase between sex-workers and the police besides providing customers to new entrants.

Recently, the Khagaul police unearthed a sex racket following a complaint by an aggrieved mother Sumitra Devi about the sudden disappearance of her daughter Neeta from Anisabad. In the course of a vigorous investigation, the police claimed to have found evidence that the daughter had been exposed to a thriving sex racket in the state.

According to K. Chandra, inspector, Khagaul Police Station, Neeta used to work as a cook and domestic help in the house of a private school owner Alok Kumar.

Three friends Ravish, Manoj and Pinchu from Patna were regular visitors to Alok's house. With time, they became close to Neeta and convinced her into going with them to Kolkata where she lived in abject conditions for two months. Although she was rescued and brought back to Patna, Ravish and his friends abducted her again in May this year and taken to Delhi.

In an FIR lodged with the Khagaul police, the victim's mother has alleged that her daughter was being sexually exploited by Ravish, Manoj and Pinchu. She maintained that Pinchu had abducted another girl Savita from Munger with similar designs. The police subsequently discovered that the trio were running a thriving sex racket that extended up to Jammu and Kashmir.

There are many such cases in Bihar. Last week, the police arrested a couple for running a call girl racket in Patna. The Srikrishnapuri police said the couple, Prabhat Kumar Ranjan alias Munna and Pinky, had been into supplying young girls for prostitution. Pinky, who works in a beauty parlor, is suspected by the police to have used her profession for supplying girls.

Ironically, even jails are not safe places in Bihar. In Beur Jail at Patna., a 30-year-old undertrial was diagnosed as pregnant at the Patna Medical College and Hospital three months after she was lodged there following murder charges.

NGO activist Dr Suman Lal of Prayas Bharti says both men and women are to be blamed for such situations. Lack of rehabilitation measures too is a factor, she says, adding that she had helped rehabilitate many sex workers and AIDS sufferers from Muzaffarpur keeping them in a hostel in Patna where three inmates were also decently married.

It is only such concerted efforts by the police, social activists administrators, politicians and society at large that can help. Otherwise, flesh trade will only continue to flourish.

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