Thuggery on Santacruz skywalk: Pay up or be charged with rape

Probably the perfect example of a policecrook nexus mdash and this played out on a very public skywalk at Santacruz railway stationThe GRP room under the bridge at Santacruz station platform where commuters are randomly caught holed in and intimidated to cough up cash midday snapped a group of sex workers going about their business until the police arrived only to shrug that they could do little PicsShadab KhanProstitutes the Government Railway Police GRP and the Santacruz police working in tandem to allow prostitution to flourish and to extort money from innocent commuters In a nighttime operation midday on Wednesday exposes the racket that has been operating for the past few monthsAlso Read The shocking truth of how the dead are dealt with in Mumbai10 pm A group of close to 40 sex workers gathered on the skywalk that connects the Santacruz railway bridge in the west to SV Road The skywalk is also connected to the public bridge that ends on the Western Express Highway in the east1 am Nothing out of the ordinary happens till the time trains ply But around 1 am midday spotted the first bunch of GRP personnel walking past the women Instead of questioning them some went past smiling at the women while a few stopped to chat with them This stretch has no lights And right under it is a beat chowkie of Santacruz police stationRead Story Heres how Mumbais private hospitals are getting rich on blood moneyGraphicRavi Jadhav130 am We spotted the GRP personnel hauling several youngsters from the skywalk into the chowkie room below the bridge The chowkie has a small room used by the railway police at the extreme southbound end of the railway platform The six men were taken into the room which was then locked from the inside145 am While that was going on the sex workers on the skywalk suddenly started running towards the public bridgeThey crossed the bridge and moved to the east side Wonder why The west side of the skywalk falls under Santacruz policersquos jurisdiction while the east comes under the Vakola policeFour constables including one woman arrived on the skywalk soon after They blew their police whistles and thwacked the bars of the skywalk with their batons as is their practice while on patrolBut here it was a clear warning that announced their arrival to anyone who cared to listen Proof of this arrived when they spotted the sex workers skipping to the east side but did nothingThey did however question us about what we were doing on the bridge When we told them we were from midday they told us to leave the spot immediately One constable even menacingly advised us ldquoThe place is not safe There are so many prostitutes on the bridge They take you to a lodge and then rob you If you donrsquot give them money they threaten you with a rape caserdquoAlso Read Mumbaikars beware Your bank details are being stolen and soldWhen we pointed to the sex workers lounging on the east side and asked them if they were not going to question them the constables shrugged it off saying it was not their jurisdictionWe then asked if they could at least call the Vakola police The constables walked away again warning us that it was not safe for us to stay there The last of them from the Santacruz police said ldquoWe are not social service branch cops and we canrsquot do anything as it is not our jurisdictionrdquo155 am The sex workers returned to the west and get back to business230 am Around 30 minutes later we were still waiting for the six youngsters to emerge from the GRP room A few cops outside the room noticed us Some time later two young men left the room We waited for them to alight from the skywalk on SV RoadWhen we reached them the first man said ldquoI work in a hotel and earn Rs 14000 a month I was waiting at the skywalk as one of my friends was coming to collect Rs 7000 I had borrowed from him for my motherrsquos operation last week As I was speaking on the phone the cops just came and took me into the police room on the platformrdquoAt this point he started crying ldquoThey told me they would frame me in a prostitution case They said they would conduct a medical test on me and take me to court They also told me that they will tell my family about it and defame me I begged them to let me go and explained that I was not approaching those sex workers and was in fact waiting for my friend But they continued to threaten me They then took all the money I hadrdquoWe asked the two to file a complaint of extortion against the cops assuring them that we would accompany themBut they refused our help saying ldquoIf we complain they will somehow put the blame on us They will cook up a story and inform our familyrdquo Without money to go home the two decided to walk all the way330 am The sex workers began to leave A Santacruz resident whom we bumped into later said ldquoThey are regulars on the skywalk for many months now Police take money from them to turn a blind eyerdquo Another resident said ldquoIt looks bad that at such a busy station and residential area such a sex racket is operating with the approval of the cops DCP zone 9 Satyanarayan Choudhary under whom Santacruz police station falls told us to speak to the senior Santacruz police inspector