For India’s domestic workers, the biggest concern is hunger not coronavirus

Savita with her children

By Musheera Ashraf, TwoCircles.net

New Delhi: Living in a one-room house in Bawana area of Delhi, 40-year-old Savita, a domestic worker, has been denied to do household chores in houses she works due to the total lockdown announced on March 25.


Support TwoCircles

‘Jab tak bimaari chal rahi hai, mat aana’ (Don’t come till the disease is over), told Savita’s mistress. Savita, who had migrated a few years back from Mahoba city of UP, now faces the grim reality for which she had left her hometown years back. She is worried because the ration she had is about to finish and can hardly last 5-6 days. With only flour and no sugar, rice or any other staple, she and her three children are struggling to survive without any work. Her husband lives in the village.

“When my son asks for lunch, I tell him I will make dinner and try to lull him to sleep,” says Savita.  She doesn’t have a ration card so she is not eligible to get anything from the government, nor has she received any help yet. Many female domestic workers like Savita had migrated from different parts of the country to Delhi with the help of NGOs working to provide employment to domestic labourers.

“I don’t have any money left to buy eatables now,” says Sylvia who migrated from Jharkhand to Delhi. Before being asked to come for work, she was given her balance money which was Rs 1000, which she has already spent on buying essential like surf, soap, cooking oil and flour. She is yet to pay the rent of her room in Kotla where she lives with her family of three children.

“I can feed my family for 4 more days from the ration I stored,” says Sylvia. She said that once the ration gets over she would try to borrow some from the shopkeeper, but if she manages to do so, she fears without work how she would be able to pay him back.

Amid these harsh circumstances, Sylvia claims that her kids understand the situation and eat whatever she gives them. Shops open time to time but she can’t go to buy because she doesn’t have money. Till now she was surviving on 5kg rice, half litre oil and half kg pulses that were distributed by someone. She doesn’t know what the future has in store for her. She is also scared that if she somehow manages to go to her village in Jharkhand, neighbors would not allow them to enter because of the fear that they might carry coronavirus.

It is estimated that the number of domestic workers in India range from official estimates of 4.2 million to unofficial estimates of more than 50 million, of which women are a significant majority. They are a crucial part of an informal and unregulated sector, obscured in private homes, not recognized as workers but rather as ‘informal help’. Many domestic workers are migrants from poorer states and are among the most marginalized and socially discriminated populations in India, mostly Dalits and other tribal minorities. They are usually landless, illiterate and innumerate, which increases their vulnerability and disempowerment.

Sumit Garg who is the head standard and assurance at the Domestic Workers’ Skill Council in Delhi informs, “More than 60 % of the domestic labourers are part-time workers and due to coronavirus people have denied taking their help in their houses which is affecting them adversely”. He adds that their health is also a matter of concern because they live in compromising conditions. In order to at least improve their living conditions, Sumit said, the Council is trying to build an online module through which they intend to circulate the videos related to hygiene and health among the workers.

Monica Kashyap, a 28-years-old migrant domestic labourer, originally from Jharkhand and presently working in Delhi, pours her heart out saying, “Hunger is the biggest challenge for us, we get paid only if we work and this crisis has reduced my income to zero.”

“The NGOs and placement agency is trying to provide food but how much will we provide,” says Silvester Kujju who owns a placement agency in Delhi to provide employment to domestic labourers.

He says that several voluntary groups and individuals who are working for their upliftment have themselves gone empty over weeks. Silvester also guides domestic laborers to access food in government schools but the disparity between number of workers and available help is too much to be bridged at a time of a global pandemic when resources are limited.

“Since they don’t have ration cards in Delhi, some of the domestic workers have even taken a high risk to travel back to their native places by foot which itself is worrisome,” Silvester adds.

SUPPORT TWOCIRCLES HELP SUPPORT INDEPENDENT AND NON-PROFIT MEDIA. DONATE HERE