Respond to bar dancers’ plea, SC orders state

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court ordered the Maharashtra government on Thursday to respond to a plea of a bar dancers’ panel challenging the constitutional validity of a 2016 law that imposes stringent conditions on dance performances in bars.

The association of dancers, waitresses, singers and other performers working in bars and hotels in Maharashtra – Bharatiya Bar Girls Union – said the conditions affected their livelihood and violated their right to earn through legitimate means.

A bench headed by justice Dipak Misra issued a notice to the state and fixed the hearing on April 20, when the court will hear other petitions challenging the

ciation said the law stigmatised their work and unreasonably interfered with the freedom of expression through dramatic performances. A woman had the right to practise the occupation of self-expression through such performances, the petition said.

Having serious objections to the clause that prohibits obscene the phrase was vague and allowed law enforcing agencies to harass women performers. The state’s concern that dancers promoted obscenity was based on a ‘popular’ belief, which was not the ground situation.

The petitioner said dances in bars were often choreographed to imitate performances of main

wood.

With regard to a ban on tips for dancers, the petitioner argued that the said practice was widely prevalent in Maharashtra and across the country. “But the act prohibits such practice contrary to traditionally-accepted form of custom, thus failing to recognise that every performance deserves