This article sheds light on the comparison between the freedom of sex workers and the freedom of sex within marriage. Development as freedom: theoretical framework Who are sex workers? And where do they come from? Sex workers are usually women who are already subsumed by other elements of social marginalization. They are predominantly illiterate, have limited economic opportunities and lower social status. Women belonging to scheduled castes and tribes have a higher representation among sex workers (particularly devdasis and women from the Nat and Bedia tribes, communities traditionally excluded from mainstream Brahminical society) while a significant percentage of women are those who have been abandoned , widows or victims of violence. Every year, hundreds of thousands of women and children are kidnapped, apostatized, seduced or sold into forced prostitution, forced to harbor hundreds if not thousands of men before being discarded. These trafficked sex slaves form the backbone of one of the most profitable illicit enterprises in the world and generate astronomically immense profits for their exploiters, because unlike narcotics, which must be grown, harvested, refined and packaged, sex slaves require no such "elaboration", ' and can be perpetually 'consumed'. It was reported that there is evidence of men breaking into the halfway house and sexually abusing inmates. Several detainees are said to have been held there illegally for months despite court orders for their release. The women who can grease the hands of the superintendent are released; others simply languish in inhumane conditions. The report concludes that the Department of Women and Child Development (DWCD) “has neither the heart, nor the will, nor the brains… middle of paper… that women are capable of manipulating their personal environment through control over material and social resources. At the same time, studies conducted in the patriarchal environments of India and Bangladesh observed that other factors that traditionally empowered women, such as the number of children they had or the amount of dowry they brought, also protected women from physical violence ( Jejeebhoy and Cook 1997; Although there have been studies examining links between aspects of women's empowerment and physical violence, few have examined their links to women's experience of forced sex within marriage available studies document that while the level of education decreases a woman's risk of being subjected to forced sexual intercourse, its employment appears to increase this risk). Comparison between sex workers and married women Conclusion