HC: Customers in brothels can be prosecuted for immoral trafficking

The Kerala high court has ruled that a person availing the services of a sex worker in a brothel can be prosecuted under the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, 1956, as the individual is inducing the sex worker to carry on prostitution by paying money.

- Vishnu Varma

The bench of justice VG Arun opined that a person utilising the services at a brothel cannot be termed as a “customer” as a sex worker was not a “product”. In most cases, sex workers are lured into the trade through human trafficking and “compelled to offer their body to satisfy the carnal pleasure of others”, the court said in its order, which HT has seen.