Childhood lost in Kolkata's red light district

A documentary on these children of the bordello won an Oscar this year, but recognition worldwide has meant little for Sonagachi's estimated 12,000 children, life for whom remains a cycle of poverty and prostitution that is difficult to break.

Many of these unschooled children of prostitutes are employed in small factories, shops and cheap eateries where they scrub dishes and mop floors for as little as 20 rupees (46 U.S. cents) a day.

Girls usually take up jobs as domestic help and then end up in prostitution once they are old enough.

The very young ones like Pinky spend their day babysitting their infant siblings in the narrow lanes of Sonagachi -- exposed to drunken men, street brawls and heroin-shooting pimps in one of Asia's biggest red light districts with 6,000 prostitutes.

But the streets are the only escape for the children from the grim atmosphere of their one-room homes which are being used by their mothers for business.

"We tell our mothers from outside the door when we are hungry. We play on the streets until we are called in," says Pinky, rocking her little sister in her arms.

"The men who come are not good people. They swear and drink. But they give my mother money."

Global Recognition

The world saw the children's struggle, humiliation, exploitation and also their craving for freedom from their squalid existence in this year's Oscar-winning documentary Born Into Brothels.

The children themselves helped make the movie, written and directed by Zana Briski and Ross Kauffman. The children were given cameras so they could learn photography and possibly improve their lives.

Much of their work including some telling shots of their surroundings were used in the film.

But the global recognition that the Oscar brought for Sonagachi hasn't translated into benefits for its unfortunate children.

"We have heard that some film has been made on our children. But I don't know much about it," says Minati Das, Pinky's young mother. "Anyway, it doesn't make a difference to us."

"Life remains exactly the same ugly way it was for Sonagachi's children before the Oscar award," said Mrinal Dutta, secretary of a group set up to represent the prostitutes of Sonaghachi.

But British-born Briski said she planned to set up a school for the children.

"Proceeds from the film will be used to build a school specifically for the children of sex workers, who are otherwise so stigmatised that no school will accept them."

A few schools are already functioning in Sonagachi which teach the children rudimentary English, vocational crafts and the local Bengali language. But barely 700 children attend the clases.

Driven by poverty, many of the young girls end up following their mothers' footsteps.

"It's all about the kids, they have gone from not being listened to, to getting so much attention. But still a lot needs to be done to remove the stigma and if anybody can change this, it's the kids themselves," Briski said.

Reuters