“If the police or Sarkar (government) intended to increase the welfare of victims (of trafficking), they would have then provided alternative income sources or work. What they do is lock us in shelter homes or send us back to our villages. We don’t have any other option than to return back, which I also did since I needed money to sustain my livelihood”.
This is a quote from an interview which was part of my ongoing research dedicated to understanding the marginalized perspectives on anti-trafficking interventions in India. This insight was offered by Barkha (name changed for confidentiality), a cis-female migrant sex worker, who was rescued twice by India’s anti-trafficking machinery but re-joined sex work later. Barkha’s statement reveals the discontent with anti-trafficking programmes, common among the supposed beneficiaries who have been growing increasingly frustrated with the country’s policies around sex work, expressly since 2011, the year in which India