Notes from Sonagachi : Poornima Thapa

Football under the "golden tree": Week 1, Sonagachi, Kolkata

  

It could have been a usual nondescript government school playground, in a regular resettlement colony, in any city of India. But it was different. 

 

It was not the kind of scene that one envisions when thinking about Asia’s largest red-light district which houses more than ten thousand brothel based sex workers. Adolescent boys, in purple and red and fresh new cleats, were bolting around the field. Some were tackling a football, others were trying to warm up, hopping, kicking the air, gleaming with perspiration. It was the football match Sonagachi had been looking forward to. 

 

The ground was hardly appropriate - with puddles and bits of stone scattered around. The spectators, mostly young men from the community, lined the boundary. Some squatting on the grass, others perched on bricks or fences. A lone mongrel was scampering around near the Titagarh Goalpost, bewildered at the conglomeration. The extras in their keds were competing for the spotlight, trying to hit the ball between the goalposts, flaunting their head-butts. The potbellied referee blew the whistle and the ground was cleared for the match. The young men were all charged up and as the match began with ‘Waka Waka’ playing on the loudspeakers, they made it very clear that they meant business. 

 

The match was being played out between Team Titagarh and Team Seoraphully as part of the Padatik Football League(PFL) funded by UNFPA . PFL was an initiative of the Amra Padatik Programme, the sports arm of Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee(DMSC). DMSC began in 1995 as a HIV/STI (sexually transmitted infection) intervention programme under Dr Samarjit Jana. Today it encompasses several initiatives which focus on multiple issues surrounding the lives of Commercial Sex Workers (CSW). The Mamta Network works towards collectivization and mobilization of HIV positive women, while Usha is a micro-credit and cooperative banking initiative exclusively for CSWs. DMSC realized that it would be difficult for these women to access the bank during office hours as they are usually up till late at night. Hence the ‘daily collection initiative’ was born, wherein the children of these women were employed to go door-to-door to collect money, which would be deposited in the bank. DMSC is also actively involved with mainstreaming the children of these women. Shrishti is a vocational training programme which trains the children in the production of handicraft goods(terracotta toys, figurines, bead work),while Beravhenge is an educational assistance program to tackle stigmatization and discrimination of these children in schools. DMSC also provides training in dance and music for these children through Komol Gandhar. Sangeeta*(name changed), who was trained to be a classical dancer by Komol Gandhar, now teaches other children from the community and dreams of establishing her own dance school one day. She is on cloud nine these days, as she will be traveling to Bangkok soon for a dance competition. For a nominal fee the children can also get enrolled at Rahul Vidya Niketan, which is a residential school that provides football and vocational training. 

 

Durbar realized that it was crucial to view the commercial sex workers in totality, complete with the social context that these women function in. The organization has hence done a splendid job of looking at the issues surrounding these women without oversimplifying them and relegating them to a medical problem of STI and HIV/AIDS. Their willingness to innovate and eagerness to involve the community has sustained them over the past 15 years, and enabled them to gain recognition here in Sonagachi, in the community as well as amongst the local authorities. The organization is practically run by the commercial sex workers and their children, with 60% of the staff being from the community. The other 40% comprises of doctors, lawyers, counselors and other technical personnel. 

 

The boys participating in the match were all trained by DMSC coaches in football training sessions held in the commercial sex areas of Titagarh and Seoraphully, where they reside with their mothers. There was much discussion about two boys from the Titagarh team who had recently participated in the World Slum Soccer championship in Poland, the only one of its kind for the underprivileged. 

 

It was a forty-five minute match with a fifteen minute break. The first half saw no goals, but the second half was more aggressive and two goals and a red card later I realized that it was more thrilling than any other sport I had ever watched on T.V. It was also different because I was rooting for both the sides.

  

Poornima is a second year student of the Masters of Public Health in Social Epidemiology programme at TISS, Mumbai