In the sweltering sugar fields of the western Indian state of Maharashtra, abusive practices such as debt bondage and child labor have long been an open secret. But in 2019, a state lawmaker named Neelam Gorhe documented a new level of brutality: Female workers were getting unnecessary hysterectomies at alarmingly high rates.

She presented her findings to the state’s health minister and alerted the region’s sugar regulator. She called on her government colleagues to ensure that workers received basic services including toilets, running water and a minimum wage — all in accordance with Indian law.

Yet most lawmakers apparently ignored the report, or read it and moved on. They launched no further investigation and passed no laws. The abuses, detailed in an investigation that ran in The New York Times, remain as widespread as ever, and young women continue to be coerced into unnecessary and potentially life-altering hysterectomies.

The reason, to many in Maharashtra, is obvious. Sugar is among the state’s most important industries, one that sells to big brand buyers such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi, and is heavily controlled by the political elite.

Most of the state’s sugar mills are led by sitting lawmakers or political figures, a new investigation by The New York Times and The Fuller Project found. That includes at least 21 state lawmakers, four members of the national Parliament, five government ministers and nearly 50 former officials. Mill bosses come from every party — both in government leadership and opposition — including the Indian National Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Shiv Sena and the National Congress Party.

Countless other mills have business or family ties to politicians and lawmakers.

That means, in many cases, that the very people who could protect workers are also profiting from their exploitation.