Sex trade thrives in Hyderabad as cops chase drugs

Gangs organising prostitution rackets rake in the moolah

Hyderabad: With the police in the tri-commissionerates of Hyderabad, Cyberabad and Rachakonda focused on identifying and arresting the gangs involved in drug trafficking, the PITA organisers in the city are having a field day. In police parlance, PITA organisers are gangs involved in organising prostitution.

These outfits run like well-oiled organisations and all of their ventures are fully planned, just like drug trafficking gangs/cartels. “It is because of huge profits in the illegal business that PITA organisers are adopting a professional approach to their activities. A lot of time needs to be invested to nab them and because of focus on drug cases, the teams are not concentrating on PITA cases,” admitted a police official working in the city.

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The top PITA organisers were operating from upscale apartments where there is high security and not everyone can venture. “The rents of the apartments are around Rs 1 lakh a month and women from different States are lodged there,” an official familiar with the PITA activities said.

In the city, the prostitution categories are classified into streets, brothels and star hotels. Body massage centres are a new addition to the list. “Individual women soliciting customers on a road is a rare sight because the sources to earn decent income have multiplied in the city. The organisers are now either running brothels at apartments and star hotels or organising it under the pretext of a body massage centre,” said Anvish Kumar (name changed), a social activist.

He explained that prostitution is directly linked to drug sales and consumption because in previous cases the police had seized drugs from brothel houses run and managed by foreign nationals. In many cases, no serious investigation was done to identify the source of the drugs.

“In the local scenario, the brothel houses double up as gambling dens, and dance bars, where liquor parties are held and consumption of local drugs takes place. In future the women considered victims in PITA cases could turn into drug carriers for organised gangs because of the rise in price of drugs due to severe clampdown by law enforcement agencies,” said the social worker.

There were 30 Anti-Human Trafficking Units across Telangana along with the local detection parties like the Task Force and Special Operations Team to gather intelligence and conduct raids on PITA organisers.