Sabeen: As sex workers, how much do you wish to learn other skills to make money?

Sex worker: Yes we wish to work. Some nice work.

Lubna (former sex worker): It's about choices. When someone gives them a good choice, they'll most definitely save up. They will utilize that choice. No one wishes to live a sinful life.

My Story

Sex workers in Lahore's Red Light District are one of the most stigmatized and impoverished groups in Pakistan. Born into prostitution, they face violence and abuse from clients, husbands, and partners. While doing my Masters at Columbia's School of Social Work, I learned of my professors' incredible work in aiding sex workers to successfully leave their industry in countries like Mongolia and Kyrgyzstan, and was inspired to do the same for sex workers in Lahore.

My first in-person contact with sex workers in Lahore's Red Light District was in April 2018, leading me to take the first steps in helping these women find another source of income. Upon learning of these women's wish to focus on Ramadan and their spirituality, I helped raise money for food packages so they do not have to engage in sex work for sustenance in this holy month. With three consecutive years of fundraising and trust established with this community, I'm moving onto the next phase: to help these women learn a skill to sustain their livelihood in alternative ways.

​

Vocational Training

In partnership with Sheed Society, a small sex worker NGO in the Red Light District, Go Green Welfare Society & Sadya's salon, we intend to provide a paid internship for sex workers, consisting of vocational training in hair and make-up, and financial literacy education. Following completing of the internship, women receive practice with mock-interviews, assistance with portfolios, with the intention to work at salons, media companies, or start their own private businesses.  My goal is to raise $20,000. 

Funds raised will be allocated towards the following: 

-salary to cover internship for sex workers

-salary for two hair/make-up trainers, who are former sex workers

-salary for a project supervisor, daughter of a former sex worker

-new make-up kits, tools, wardrobes & cellphones for trainees

-matched savings to assist with start up of business & kick off new vocation

-project management costs, such as transportation, literacy materials, etc.

This project aims for sex workers to reduce income from sex work, or leave sex work completely, thereby increasing safety and security in their lives. 

​Impact of Previous Studies

This project is based on previous studies targeting female sex workers in Kenya, India, Undarga, and Kazakastan. Offering financial literacy training and micro-loans to sex workers resulted in a decrease in income from sex work or stopping sex work completely, developing small businesses, and lower incidences of HIV/STIs. Ultimately, sex workers will be economically empowered, better protected from reproductive health diseases, and safer in their relationships. The mission of this project is to promote sex workers' agency, authority, and autonomy to secure income, and promote economic decision-making.

Interview with Sex Workers

Last year I went to Pakistan and interviewed a group of sex workers in Lahore's Red Light District. 

Sabeen: If you had other work, then would you be able to speak up more? If someone didn’t want to use a condom, could you decline that client?​ 

Former sex worker: They can’t say no until they earn themselves. From some other source. Then they have willpower. If they don’t get a client that day, then [they can think] “forget it, we don’t need it”.​ ​ ​

Sabeen: How much violence do you experience from your partners?

Sex Worker: I’ll share reality with you. If he’s your boyfriend, husband, or client, he is most definitely violent. He is violent because he just wants to show that he is a man, he wants to say that he is a man. This is my own value.

Lubna Tayyab, a former sex worker, started a small community-based organization, called Sheed Society.

      "Sex worker and sweeper – they are both needed, but neither is accepted. Every man wants a sex worker, every house wants a sweeper. But no one accepts us. They come here and commit sins,  in the darkness of the night, and then during the day, they are the good ones, and we are the bad ones? We need to empower these women. 

      Why us? Did God send us different air? Different light of the sun? Do we get grain from somewhere else? Everything that the general community eats, we eat the same thing. We are in so much need, if one girl is making money, 10 people are eating from that. They have responsibilities. They have their uncles, grandmothers, children, to take care of. Where do they go? Have any of you ever accepted one of them? They can’t even think to leave because of their necessity. Has anyone from the outside come to this community to help us? Let’s give them respect. We won’t make them wives, we’ll make them our sisters. Let go of this work, we’ll take care of you. Who hasn’t come here to do an interview with me? BBC, CNN, Dawn, Samaa, GEO, there isn’t one Pakistani channel who hasn’t come here to interview. But no one does anything."

Photos by Zainul Abidin; Lahore, Pakistan

​https://www.facebook.com/sabeen.ahmed.35