New Delhi Police claimed to have arrested a local holy man and six alleged prostitutes on suspicion of involvement in a multimillion-dollar prostitution racket. According to the police, the 'godman', Shiv Murat Dwivedi, aged 39, together with accomplice Praveen Kumar, had set up a temple in south Delhi's Khanpur area, which was used as a cover for the prostitution business.

Two of the arrested women are air-hostesses,one from British Airways and one from the Indian airline Jagson. One of the other women is an MBA student, and one is an aspiring Bollywood actress, taking regular acting classes. All the girls are between the ages of 22 and 25.

According to the police, the six women were part of a prostitution ring of as many as 200 prostitutes, including flight attendants and students, who often 'served' clients in five-star hotels. The arrest was made public on Friday, February 26, 2010, while the actual arrest took place the evening before, after police had received information of some pimps and sex workers were trying to make a deal near a local cinema in south Delhi. The police deployed a decoy customer, who was able to strike a deal, after which the group was arrested.http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,587751,00.html?test=latestnewshttp://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/Godman-nabbed-with-six-women-sex-racket-busted/articleshow/5622097.cms

According to Local police officer H G S Dhaliwal, Dwivedi came to New Delhi in 1988, where he started working as a security guard. Later, he reportedly worked in a massage parlor in Lajpat Nagar.

His arrest on February 25, 2010 wasn't the first time. Earlier, he was arrested in 1997 for involvement in prostitution, and again in 1998 for receiving stolen property.http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/Godman-nabbed-with-six-women-sex-racket-busted/articleshow/5622097.cms

The New Delhi prostitution arrests are not the first time a holy temple has been used for sex trafficking. In November 2009, in what became known as the Kanchipuram Temple Priest Scandal, a Kanchipuram priest was accused of having sex with at least four women while performing the rites of worship, and taping the encounters with his cell phone. The sexual acts were discovered because a cell phone repairman had found the videos when repairing the phone, and had started selling copies of the footage.http://blog.taragana.com/n/kanchipuram-priest-scandal-revealed-231054/