Abstract

Male sex workers in India go through some of the worst abuse, sexual or otherwise. Still, because of their non-negligible representation in the socio-legal sphere, the woes faced by this minority group get promptly ignored while having little to no legal recourse available to them. One of the main contributing factors to rendering them invisible compared to their female counterparts is due to the difficulty society faces in placing them side by side with the narrative consisting of a stereotypical image of a sexual victim who needs to be saved, rescued, and rehabilitated from a life of 'prostitution'. Males, being the biologically more potent sex, better suits the ideal image of an offender than the offended. The rape laws of India, being penetration-based, perpetuate the same wrongful idea that males cannot be sexually forced unless they have some form of will themselves. This perspective disregards the various frames of reference that can be at play while missing out on the central component that defines rape: lack of consent. One of the main reasons this perspective is so prevalent in India is the lack of discussion and discourse around female criminality. The leading portrayal of females as the frightened, gentle, and worried preservers of social norms stop the public from considering females as possible perpetrators of violent crime who are willing to engage in criminal acts that are almost entirely male-dominated. This paper will attempt to critically study the present statutes and legislations regulating prostitution and rape in India to understand how the lack of acknowledgement of female criminality is putting male sex workers at risk and re-emphasize the need for gender-neutral rape laws in India.

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