Even before the dance bars reopen, Mumbai's former bar girls are twirling in delight and anticipation. It has been a hard 13 years for thousands of women who once performed at Mumbai's infamous bars. For these women, dancing in front of customers was not exploitative or degrading, but rather empowering and glamorous — it was a job that paid them thousands every night, just to put on a shiny dress and dance the night away.

Everything changed after the 2005 ban. Where they once earned R3,000 a day working at the dance bars, the women sometimes could not earn the same amount in a whole month, despite the back-breaking back work they did as domestic help. Many of them were thrown out of their homes when they couldn't make rent, their children had to drop out of school because there was no money for fees, and several were abandoned by their husbands or boyfriends in their time of need. Some, in desperation, turned to prostitution. Yet others resorted to suicide.