MUMBAI, Dec. 15 -- The sessions court has struck down a magistrate court order detaining 12 commercial sex workers who were rescued by the Malwani police in June, purportedly to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases to their clients. The sessions court held that the magisterial order was illegal, as all the rescued women were over 18 and could not have been detained beyond 21 days for a specific inquiry contemplated under the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act (ITPA), 1956. Additional sessions judge Mujibodeen Shaikh also ordered the police to repatriate 11 of the sex workers to Bangladesh after they informed the court that they were illegally brought into India with a promise of high-paying jobs and were forced into prostitution, and that they wished to return to their native places. All the 12 women were rescued by the Malwani police in Malad in June this year from a brothel. They were produced before the jurisdictional metropolitan magistrate court, which undertook an inquiry contemplated under the ITPA. Their medical reports suggested that at least nine of the rescued women were suffering from venereal diseases. After receipt of the inquiry reports on July 2, the magistrate felt that the women would most likely return to prostitution if they were released from their detention at a shelter and would pass on the STDs to the men they came in contact with, and thus allowed their detention to continue. The sessions court accepted the women's arguments that their involvement in commercial sex work was not a crime, and they could not be detained beyond the period of 21 days as permitted under the ITPA, 1956, and declared their detention beyond that period to be illegal. "The appellants / victims are adult women. During inquiry, victim Nos 1 to 7 and 9 to 12 disclosed their roots from Bangladesh. They have admitted about having indulged into sex work under threat and coercion. The victims have indulged into this business forcefully through the agents who brought them from Bangladesh to India," (sic) the court said and ordered their immediate release from the shelter. The sessions court also ordered the Malwani police to initiate the process of repatriating 11 of the sex workers to Bangladesh after they told the court that they wished to return to their native places....