Official finding Hindu and Hindu-derived contexts Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, India · 2007

India: ritual dedication of girls (Devadasi/Jogini/Mathamma) feeding sexual exploitation

Record class

Institutional event

Evidence status

Official finding

Authority role

community and temple structures dedicating girls to a deity

Organization

No organization assigned

Spiritual nexus

The temple/deity 'marriage' dedication is the organizing religious mechanism: girls are ritually bound to a deity, which the community treats as conferring standing sexual access, replacing ordinary trafficking recruitment with doctrinal/ritual sanction.

Religious marriage or family control
Ritual, oath, or initiation

Evidence structure

Proceedings

2007-07-01 · official/institutional finding on a systemic practice

Anti-Slavery International report; cited in CEDAW review of India. Anti-Slavery International documented the dedication of girls (often Dalit) to a deity or temple (Devadasi/Jogini/Mathamma), after which they are sexually exploited by community men under religious sanction — a practice framed as ritual slavery. Despite a 1988 ban, enforcement is minimal (reportedly ~25 cases in the ban's first 20 years against an estimated tens of thousands of women in ritual bondage).

Documented coercion mechanisms

ritual 'marriage'/dedication of girls to a deity conferring standing sexual access

Primary record

Sources

specialist monitoring methodology and findings 'Women in Ritual Slavery: Devadasi, Jogini and Mathamma in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, Southern India', Anti-Slavery International (July 2007).: Anti-Slavery International documents the ritual dedication of girls to deities/temples and their subsequent sexual exploitation under religious sanction.

Contextual record

Background & context

Institutional and pattern-level sources on Hindu and Hindu-derived contexts, not specific to this one case.

Hinduism Today (2005) 'ISKCON Child Abuse Lawsuit Settled for US$9.5 Million', Hinduism Today, 26 May. Available at: hinduismtoday.com (Accessed: 14 July 2026).: 'A US bankruptcy court has ordered the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) to pay $9.5 million... to about 450 victims of sexual, physical and emotional abuse at its boarding schools in the US and India. The abuses relate to the 1970s and the '80s... Some of them have charged rape, while others have catalogued physical and emotional abuse... The revelations had led to the closure of the US gurukulas (schools) by the mid-1980s.' Note: this is a civil settlement reached through Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, not a criminal conviction, and the claimant count varies by source as the fund grew.

Related record

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