The Invisible Workers

Domestic Workers Need Strong Support Network

A few days back, I bumped into Suwarna, my earlier house-help, at a neighbourhood provision stre. She was pleading with the shopkeeper to continue giving her groceries on credit, he blatantly refused to say, that she should first clear her dues of the past three months. Suwarna shared about losing work at two households during the lockdown last year and taking a loan of Rs. 20,000 from a microfinance company for starting a vegetable and fruit selling business, which she didn’t continue when the lockdown was lifted. She shared that many families are buying dishwashers and vacuum cleaners for managing household cleaning work, leaving many like her jobless.

My current house help’ Malti’ is in her mid-fifties; her husband is a migrant worker, currently based in Gujarat at a construction site. He never sends her any money or extends support in other forms as she is a working wife. Malti’s children also refuse to provide her any support, often saying they have their own families to look after, as money is never enough for their own living requirements, even though she extends support to them on a regular basis. Malti often shares with us that she is nothing but a cash cow surrounded by people, having no sense of fairness or appreciation for the work she has been doing. Malti lives in a constant fear that she will be thrown out of the house that she shares with her two married sons if her earnings stop.

The women domestic help often live a life in uncertainty.The paid labour along with invisible labour at home, makes them so vulnerable that they never truly know how to live life freely. For several women like Suwarna and Malti, it is a battle of survival, to have a regular flow of cash, many end up taking poorly paid housework. In the absence of labour protection, they feel overworked but unrecognised as if they are non-existing.

Domestic work is dominated by women; over 80 per cent of domestic workers across the globe are women. Informal and unrecognised, domestic work carries the long legacy of devaluation of women’s labour in the household. Domestic work, as well as domestic workers, is not valued as the home-based tasks are difficult to measure in terms of economic value.

Virginia Woolf in “a room of one’s own” argues that women need money and space of their own if they intend to pursue things of their choice (for Virginia, it was writing fiction). Women domestic workers earn money but for a majority, it is not contributing sufficiently to their well-being, control over assets and participation in decision making.

Who Are They?

Domestic workers or help are persons engaged by households to render domestic services for remuneration. The work undertaken by domestic workers, mostly women, includes house cleaning, cleaning utensils, washing clothes, cooking, taking care of young children or elderly or differently-abled. Domestic work also includes driving for the owner, housekeeping and security services, tasks generally performed by men.

Domestic work engages a large number of informal sector workers, mainly women. It is certainly a growing segment of the informal workforce. As per National Sample Survey (NSSO Statistics-2011–2012,68th round) estimation 3.9 million people are employed as domestic workers by private households, of which 2.6 million are female domestic workers. As current figures are not available, the actual number of people engaged as house helps must be much higher.

Life and livelihood in times of Coronavirus

The world of domestic help is changing amid the corona crisis. It is a possibility that the constantly increasing demand for domestic and care workers will see new business rules till the crisis settles. I have been interacting with several domestic workers in Patna for almost a year, and also conducted in-depth conversations with a few (4–5) to know the on-ground situation, economic and social sentiments, coping mechanisms, fears, and priorities.

Almost everyone interacted with said that the lockdown meant poverty and hunger for them. The period showcased their vulnerabilities and unprotected lives. The lives were more difficult for migrant women, who said that they have no savings left to utilize during the no-work (and no payment) period. Many were excluded from the mainstream financial system as they don’t have a basic bank account to receive entitlements. Other prominent impacts included reduced income at household due to decline in economic activities resulting in economic stress. For many households, it has also led to increased verbal arguments, outbursts, abuse, and violence by the spouse.

Interactions with Patna based domestic workers further yield into below-mentioned findings:

1. Patna being the capital city has attracted many migrant women from nearby districts to work as domestic workers. Many factors lead women to take up domestic work, such as growing expenses at household, husband inadequately contributing to expenses, need of economic autonomy, easy job availability at neighborhood, flexible work hours and manageable work profile. Moreover cleaning, cooking, taking care of children and the elderly is something they already know
2. Most were okay about the unregulated domain of the private home, that they lacked education or appropriate skill-set to get employed in the organized sector. Domestic work gave them flexible work hours along with economic autonomy.
3. Life is totally dependent on earnings from work. There is hardly any financial stability. Many domestic workers are principal bread-earners of their families.
4. Amid the Coronavirus crisis, domestic work is no longer an easily available livelihood option for them. Some families have taken loans from local moneylenders to manage liquidity crises which they find difficult to repay in the absence of a regular source of income.
5. On existing reporting systems (helpline) on domestic violence, many said reporting won’t help in resolving personal matters. Women interacted with, were uncomfortable in disclosing about physical or sexual violence during lockdown but they mentioned the occurrence of verbal arguments and occasional hitting primarily due to economic stress.

The Formalization: Support Framework

Due to high unemployment, informal employment is predominant in India. Informal employment is preferred by the worker due to ease of entry, no educational qualification criterion, and low skill requirements. For employers, because the employee-employer relationship is informal, has no regulatory bindings, and is economical as wages are low and labour is available cheap for the unorganised sector.

Domestic work is one of the most vulnerable forms of informal sector employment, it actually shares the highest share of informal employment among women. Due to the increasing ageing population, nuclear families, increasing female work participation, and urbanization, the demand for domestic workers is growing and going to grow manifold. Still, there are no suitable working models for domestic workers which support their work formalization and demand better wages and work conditions. Further, state-driven initiatives in the form of legal and regulatory frameworks are also yet to be undertaken to formalize the sector in Bihar, except setting a minimum wage rate for domestic workers.

Many states took the initiative to formalize the sector. Notably, Maharashtra enacted the Maharashtra Domestic Workers Welfare Board Act 2008. The act provides for the setting of a district domestic labour welfare Board with several functions such as registration of domestic workers; extending benefits in event of an accident; maternity benefits; funeral expenses in case of death of a registered worker. The Kerala Domestic Workers (Livelihood Rights, Regulation of Employment, Conditions of Service, Social Security, and Welfare) Bill 2009 attempted to regularise the domestic work sector in the state.

The Central Government is already implementing the Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008, to provide social security relating to life and disability cover, health and maternity benefits, old age protection to the unorganized workers including domestic workers. Central Sector Schemes like PMJJBY, PMSBY, PM-SYM provide social security cover to all the unorganized workers including domestic workers in respect of life & disability cover, insurance and pension. Ayushman Bharat PMJAY provides secondary and tertiary health benefits to all unorganized workers including domestic workers who are covered as eligible beneficiaries as per Socio-Economic Caste Census Data, 2011. The state and central acts are hardly enforced and ineffective in their present form; It requires eligible ones to register at the district authority, and the social security part is reduced to schemes. Furthermore, hardly any domestic worker or her employer is aware of it.

The Ministry of Labour & Employment is considering bringing about a national policy on domestic workers. The draft policy proposes to recognize part-time and full-time domestic help as workers; give them rights to register with the state labour department, ensure minimum wages and regularised work hours to the domestic workers. The draft policy is still at a consideration stage and yet to be presented for cabinet approval. The Ministry is in the process of developing a comprehensive National Database of the Unorganized Workers to collect relevant information of unorganized workers including domestic workers and inter-alia help in the delivery of various social security and welfare schemes being implemented for them.

Covid times demonstrated vulnerabilities of domestic workers with a lasting impact. With no job protection, no state or central response for them amid these challenging times, they live in perpetual confusion of life versus livelihood.

Contributor: Sonmani Choudhary is a professional with over 17 years of national and South East Asia experience in the development & financial sector. She has worked with organizations like BASIX Social Enterprise Group, Micro Save and SIDBI on areas of financial inclusion, institutional and community business development and technical assistance to rural banks, cooperatives and microfinance based institutions. Presently she is with Centre for Catalyzing Change, as part of the Sakshamaa Initiative supported by BMGF which seeks to bridge the gender gap by garnering data and evidence through a network of researchers and provides technical support to the Govt of Bihar. References:

Originally published at https://medium.com on November 19, 2021.