Spa owners' body moves Bombay High Court alleging illegal raids, moral policing by authorities

Wellness Welfare Association, an association of spa owners has moved the Bombay High Court alleging that spa centres and massage parlours are being targeted subject to moral policing and raided unlawfully by police authorities without due cause, justification and sanction of law..The petition has also challenged the cases initiated under the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act against such parlours and spa centres, its owners and the women working there as massage therapists.The plea sought directions to concerned authorities to refrain from conducting arbitrary raids and interfering in the peaceful functioning of the licensed centres and parlours. “The police authorities conduct bogus raids under the lame excuse of unearthing some immoral trafficking, without any material or evidentiary basis and in utter transgression of the rights guaranteed to the members of the Petitioner Association and their personnel working in the Spas or Massage Parlours under Articles 14, 19 and 21 the Constitution of India, 1950, in addition to being in the teeth of the mandatory procedures under the ITPA” the petition stated..The entire cause of action for the Mumbai Police to act against spas was based on a false complaint filed by of the criminally minded people who only have a sole malicious intention of trying to extort money from the genuine spa owners, it was submitted.“The Mumbai Police arbitrarily exercise their power and completely ruin the reputation of the Spa owners and the employees/ Therapist working there. For reasons best known to them, the Mumbai Police proceed with a pre-conceived notion that the spa and massage centre is a brothel and the girls working there are prostitutes,” the plea underscored..The plea pointed out that the petitioners had written to the Ministry of Home Department, State of Maharashtra pointing out their grievances but received no response to the same.The plea highlighted that the all the spas/ ayurvedic centres registered under the petitioner-association are being run after getting proper licenses from the the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) under the Bombay Shops and Establishments Act. Despite that, the licensed Spas are being branded as a brothels by Mumbai Police, it was alleged.The petition filed through advocates Shashwat Anand, Siddharth Naik and Pankaj Kandhari, therefore, urged the Court to frame appropriate guidelines and issue directions to regulate the powers of the police authority in conducting gratuitous and frivolous raids without any material basis or receipt of any valid information/ complaint.