S.C. Dharmadhikar, J.@mdashThe petitioner has filed this review petition seeking review of direction No. 5 in Para 9 of the Judgment dated 21.07.03 rendered in the above Writ Petition.
2. The petitioner had challenged the said Judgment in a SLP before the Supreme Court but it is common ground before us that the said petition was withdrawn with liberty to file a review petition.
3. That is how the instant review petition.
4. The original Writ Petition from which the review petition arises was filed in this Court in the year 1997. The petitioner No. 1 is a Society registered under the Societies Registration Act 1860 and the others are connected with the said Society. We need not refer to the purpose and objects for which the Society has been established in as much as the petition was filed seeking direction with regard to rehabilitation of those sex workers who have been brought into the State of Goa and are forced to indulge in activities which are immoral and indecent. They are rather trapped in unorganized flesh trade such of those who are victims of the activities enlisted above, were not being rehabilitated and there were no means for their survival otherwise. They were coming from poorest strata of the Society and forced into flesh trade. It is in such circumstances and public interest, the Petition was filed seeking appropriate directions.
5. On 21.07.03, the said Writ Petition was disposed off and the Division Bench of this Court issued number of directions to the State of Goa.
6. We are not concerned with directions No. 1 to 4 and 6. All that is urged is that direction No. 5 would be misconstrued and misread by the State of Goa to mean that a Commercial Sex Worker brought from outside the State of Goa need not be rehabilitated by the State of Goa in Goa.
7. Direction No. 5 reads thus:
(5) Since the Commercial Sex Workers are being brought from outside the State of Goa, into the State of Goa, the Government of Goa is not bound to rehabilitate them except to the extent provided by specific directions in the judgments of the Apex Court. The rescued Commercial Sex Workers be deported to the State from where they come. The Goa State Commission for Women with the National Commission for Women to take steps so that the said women are rehabilitated in the State from where they hail with the assistance of the respective State Governments.
8. A perusal of direction would reveal that the Division Bench was of the opinion that Commercial Sex Workers being brought from outside the State of Goa into the State, was a known phenomenon. However, the Government of Goa is not bound to rehabilitate them except to the extent provided by specific directions in the Judgments of the Apex Court. The underlined portion emphasized by us would reveal that if there are Judgments which direct rehabilitation even in such cases, then, the Apex Court Judgments and directions therein are binding on the State of Goa. If there are none, only then the rescued Commercial Sex Workers be deported by the State of Goa to the State from where they have migrated to Goa but that does not mean that the State of Goa need not take any steps to assist them or else involving the Goa State Commission for Women was not necessary. Thus, State of Goa is still obliged to assist them but their rehabilitation would be a joint effort. Such victims are not destitutes and should not be abandoned by the State is the clear view. Read thus, there is neither scope for misreading nor misconstruction of the Judgment. The Judgment should be read as not being contrary to any Supreme Court decision. The Supreme Court decisions bind everybody including the State. The Judgment itself states that if there are directions to the contrary in the Apex Court decision, then, same would be binding and not just direction No. 5.
9. Even otherwise, there is no basis for the apprehension of Mr. Lawande, learned Advocate, because the Supreme Court decision which is in the case of
10. In the light of the statement of the Government Advocate so also the manner in which Clause 5 of the Judgment is worded, we see no reason to exercise our jurisdiction u/s 114 read with Order XLVII of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, to review the Judgment of this Court even to the limited extent prayed in this application. With the clarifications that are issued by us, there is no reason to entertain this review application and it is accordingly disposed off.
