LexBUDHADEV KARMASKAR versus STATE OF WEST BENGAL
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[2011] 9 S.C.R. 680 ... A BUDHADEV KARMASKAR v. STATE OF WEST BENGAL (Criminal Appeal No. 135 of 2010) • B AUGUST 02, 2011 ~ [MARKANDEY KAT JU AND GYAN SUDHA MISRA, JJ.] Public Interest Litigation - Issue as regards the problems of sex workers in the country - Held: Sex workers are also c human beings and thus, are entitled to a life of dignity - Sex workers can lead a life of dignity if they earn their livelihood through their technical skills instead of selling their bodies - Thus, panel consisting of senior advocates and NGO • constituted by Supreme Court, to monitor rehabilitation of sex D workers - The Secretaries, Social Welfare Departments of the ~ State Governments and the Central Government to meet the panel constituted to discuss how proper schemes in the spirit of the order by this Court can be prepared - Thereafter, the State and the Centre to come out with the schemes/ E suggestions indicating rehabilitation of sex workers, effective feedback as regards rehabilitation with a list of sex workers willing for rehabilitation - Panel constituted to submit another report of the progress made by the next date of hearing - ,• Social welfare - Constitution of India, 1950 - Article 21. F CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Criminal Appeal No. 135 of 2010. From the Judgment & Order dated 25.07.2007 of the High Court of Calcutta in Criminal Appeal No. 487 of 2004. G • • P.P. Malhotra, ASG Pradip Ghosh, Jayant Bhushan, T.S. Doabia, Ashok Bhan, Ratnakar Dash, I. Venkatanarayana, R. Sundravaradan, A. Maria;putham, AG, Dr. Manish Singhvi, Shail Kr. Dwivedi, Manjit Singh, AAG, Pijush K. Roy, Reena H 680 BUDHADEV KARMASKAR v. STATE OF WEST 681 i ... BENGAL George, Gautam Talukdar, Lajja Ram, Gaurav Sharma, D.S. A Mahra, Sushma Suri, Sadhana Sandhu, Mohd. Khairati, lrshad Ahmad, Vijay Verma, Anitha Shenoy, Ashutosh Sharma, Alka ~ Sinha, Anuvrat Sharma, D. Mahesh Babu, Ramesk Allanki, V. Pattabhi Ram, Savita Dhanda, Ranjan Mozumbar (for Corporate ~ Law Group) Anil Srivastava, Rituraj Biswas, Gopal Singh, B Manish Kumar, Anjani Aiyag·ari, S. wasim A. Quadiri, Anil Katiyar, Hemantika vyahi, Suveni Banerjee, Ashwini Kumar, Tarjit Singh, Kamal Mohan Gupta, Abhishek Sood, Rohit Kr. Singh, Sunil Fernandes, Astha Sharma, P.V. Dinesh, Jogy Scaria, Sanjay Kharde (for Asha G. Nair), Kh. No~in Singh, c Balaji Srinivasan, Radha Shyam Jena, Kuldip Singh, R.K. Pandey, H.S. Sandhu, K.K. Pandey, Mohit Mudgil, Aruna ·~ Mathur, Avneesh Arputham, Yusuf Khan, Megha Gaur, Arputham Aruna & Co., Aniruddha P. Mayee, Abhijit Sengupta, ": B.P. Yadav, Anima Kujur, Anil K. Jha, Dharmendra Kr. Sinha, D Chhaya Kumari, V.G. Pragasam, S.J. Aristotle, Prabu Ramasubramanian, Savita Singh, Anand Grover, Tripti Tandon, Shivangi Rai, Amritananda Chakraborty, Shefali Malhotra, Prakash Kumar Singh, Ravi Kant, A. Subhashini, Aishwarya Bhati, C.D. Singh, K.N. Madhusoodhanan, M.T. George, E Subramonium Prasad, Sunil Kumar, Singh, Mukti Singh, Jatinder Kr. Bhatia, Manpreet Sing Doabia, Kiran Bhardwaj, Edward Belho, A. Athuimei R. Naga, K. lnatoli Serna, Nimshim ,~, Voshum, Ranjan Mukherjee for the appearing parties. :r The following order of the Court was delivered F ORDER "Pinha tha daam-e-sakht qareeb aashiyaan ke \ Udhne hi na paaye the ki giraftaar hum hue" G Mirza Ghalib 1. This exercise was initiated by us by our order dated 14th February 2011. By that order we dismissed the appeal of the appellant, who was convicted for murdering a sex worker in a H 682 SUPREME COURT REPORTS [20111 9 S.C.R. .... ' A red light area in Kolkata by battering her head repeatedly against the wall and the floor of a room. Having dismissed the appeal we suo motu converted the case into a PIL by the same order in order to address the problems of sex workers in the country. • B • 2. In our order dated 14th February, 2011 we observed: "This is a case of brutal murder of a sex worker. Sex workers are also human beings and no one has a right to assault or murder them. A person becomes a prostitute c not because she enjoys it but because of poverty. Society must have sympathy towards the sex workers and must not look down upon them. They are also entitled to a life of dignity in view of Article 21 of the Constitution. • D In the novels and stories of the great Bengali writer Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyaya, many prostitutes have been sh.own to be women of very high character,
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