Apne Aap Women Worldwide began as a community-based initiative of women in prostitution in the Khetwadi/ Kamatipura red light area of Mumbai in 1998. Twenty-two women in prostitution, who had worked with Emmy award-winning journalist Ruchira Gupta, to make a documentary “The Selling of Innocents,” decided to start this organization.  Their aim was to lead the end of their own exploitation and prevent their sisters from being exploited through sex trafficking.