The domestic help’s International Women’s Day
So who’s giving the day off to their housemaid/ domestic help for Women’s Day?
Thus spake some folks on Twitter recently. To me it seemed a self-contradictory expectation. Generations of women have struggled to join the workforce and stay there; to gain financial independence or just have some money of our own; for fair pay, maternity leave and work environments free of fear and harassment. Even for the sake of tokenism and symbolism that comes with International Women’s Day, this suggestion defeated itself.
“Akka,” my domestic help asks in Kannada, “Why don’t you have a TV set at home? You work too much.” Mercifully, she doesn’t ask me to send her housekeeping instructions on WhatsApp like one of my former helps in Bangalore. Where I leave a mess, she tidies my home for me. I recognise my privilege of being able to employ her and several helps before her. Much of the exploitation and de-humanisation of domestic help in our culture stems from the fault lines of caste and class and a lack of respect for manual labour. Working with one’s hands is looked down upon. A pen-pusher or a babu whose work is mental (but not intellectual) often has greater social standing than a technician or a weaver. Additionally, house help is treated with little dignity or respect in patriarchal societies because keeping the home clean and functioning has traditionally been women’s work.
My domestic help receives what she and I decided was fair wage for her. I give her a day off every week and pay her the full wages after she has taken leaves of absence for sickness or to be with a child, because that is what a responsible employer should do. (Many employers of domestic help don’t, I have been told.) I never give her more money than her monthly wage. Not even on festive occasions when the gardener or the security guard gently reminds you that a bakshish (reward) is due. Women are vulnerable to financial coercion from entitled and abusive partners, in-laws or families who want to wrench away their money from them. Refusal to part with money may mean facing domestic violence, physical or otherwise. I give away things to her that I do not want or need but are in a usable condition. A disused backpack and notebooks for her children, a new coffee mug and bags that came as conference swag, and food that would go past its use-by date while I am away travelling for long periods. I think of the resale value of these things before I give them away, should an abusive relative appropriate them and sell them for money. Doing all these things makes more sense to me than giving my domestic help the day off for International Women’s Day.
Circling back to the folks on Twitter who speak with much civility and nuance, I am a woman working in the relatively underpaid not-for-profit sector that is not without its dangers. Women’s Day wasn’t a holiday for me and many women like me either.
