Every year, hundreds of thousands of women and children are abducted, deceived, seduced, or sold into forced prostitution, coerced to service hundreds if not thousands of men before being discarded. These trafficked sex slaves form the backbone of one of the world's most profitable illicit enterprises and generate huge profits for their exploiters, for unlike narcotics, which must be grown, harvested, refined, and packaged, sex slaves require no such "processing," and can be repeatedly "consumed...

Though a directive principle of the constitution, a uniform civil code of law has never been written or instituted in India. As a result, in matters of personal law—the segment of law concerning marriage, dowry, divorce, parentage, legitimacy, wills, and inheritance—individuals of different backgrounds must appeal to their respective religious laws for guidance or rulings...

Contributing to recent debates on feminism, and Indian feminism in particular, this book assesses how feminists in India have impacted legal and social debates on women's rights, violence against women and sexuality from the 1970s...