A Brighter Future For Sunita

Photo Credit: Anita Khemka

Sunita is a migrant worker who came to Mumbai in search of work. She found a job working for daily wages in one of the 200 “nakas” or open labor markets around the city. While employed at the naka she was sexually exploited by managers at the construction site and the contractor. Not able to earn sufficient wages through the naka, Sunita was forced into sex work in order to support her disabled husband and five teenage children.

Sunita’s life began to change when she met an outreach worker from a USAID funded non-government organization NIRMAN that promotes HIV/AIDS awareness among women working in construction. During an information session on HIV/AIDS prevention at Khar Naka in Mumbai, Sunita met an outreach worker who was able to help and provide counseling. With a new understanding of the possibility of acquiring the HIV infection, Sunita was able to protect herself from coercive sex. She shared her experiences of being sexually exploited at the hands of her employers with the NGO and expressed a desire to work as peer educator to help others facing similar exploitation.

Sunita continues to work as a day laborer at construction sites, but she is no longer involved in sex work, nor is she being sexually exploited. Working as peer educator for the past eight months, she has set a motivating example to other women workers at the nakas. New opportunities have come because of the changes in her life. Sunita has addressed a state-level discussion on sexual harassment at the workplace organized by the Women’s Commission and the India Center for Human Rights & Law.. As a peer counselor Sunita has counseled more than 200 migrant women workers about HIV/AIDS and sexual exploitation. She hopes to reach others and states, “I am determined to share my experience with other women like me, so that they can safeguard their lives and support their families with dignity.”