Unseen Chains

The Gates to Hell The term "The Gates to Hell" is used by the German magazine Stern to describe Kamathipura in Mumbai, India, which is the largest and oldest red-light district in Asia. This area is home to tens of thousands of women involved in prostitution, with the number growing by a thousand annually. Most of these women have been trafficked from other countries. The majority were deceived by family and friends and sold into this life. Shockingly, many of these women are under the age of ten. Women who enter this area at a young age gradually lose hope in the outside world. Even those who manage to escape find themselves with no viable way to make a living and often return voluntarily because they have nowhere else to go. These women create their own 'lives' here. They form families with the men who visit as clients and raise children whose fathers are unknown. These children do not have the opportunity to go to school, and the girls often naturally follow in the footsteps of the women around them into prostitution. This is the 'normal life' in this place. The story of the women from "The Gates to Hell" highlights the difficulties of escaping from societal indifference, discrimination, and poverty. To shed light on these harsh realities, I aim to bring the darkness of this place into the light and share the voices of these women through photography.