Drawing upon ethnographic research and an analysis of judgments at the Special Anti-Prostitution Court in Mumbai, Chapter 4 shows how rescued women’s testimony is only one (albeit significant) factor shaping the outcomes of trials against the accused. The chapter illustrates how these trials are primarily shaped by the priorities of Indian law, its interpretation by the police and prosecutors, and the possibilities that requirements for “respectable” witnesses both in the ITPA and in Indian procedural law open up for NGOs. It reveals that anti-trafficking NGOs’ participation in the Special Court is neither entirely dependent on victim-witness testimony, nor on proving sex trafficking. Overall, the chapter shows how evidence and testimony at this Special Court is presented to prove prostitution rather than sex trafficking, and how NGOs, police, and other witnesses participate in what the author refers to as the choreography of these trials. Beyond victim-witness testimony, it examines how the testimony of other prosecution witnesses (police officers, NGO workers, and decoy customers), forms of material evidence (cash, packets of condoms and tissues), and medical reports shape ITPA cases and their outcomes at the Mumbai Special Court.

Chapter 5 focuses on NGO-assisted judicial inquiries with rescued women in the magistrate’s chambers at the Mumbai Special Court. These inquiries, prescribed by the ITPA, seek details about rescued women’s backgrounds and entry into the sex trade. Based on the information women provide, magistrates make decisions about their custody – either sending them back to their families or to shelters and economic rehabilitation programs. Per the ITPA, these decisions are based not on the consent or preferences of rescued adult women, but on the evaluations magistrates make. The chapter demonstrates how inquiries do not merely seek information, but use the tactics of counseling and censure to evaluate identity and kinship. It shows how inquiries are framed both by accusations of immorality and by concerns about victimhood, and how women respond with narratives centered on poverty and kinship. By focusing on this site and process, the chapter illuminates how female judges and NGO workers combine state paternalism, moral reform, sexual humanitarianism, and immigration control in the governance of prostitution. The chapter also shows how Bangladeshi women are targeted by, and navigate, a culture of suspicion and regime of documentation that brings anti-trafficking, anti-prostitution, and anti-immigration imperatives together.