Cherylann Mollan
BBC News, Mumbai
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Domestic workers in India are often faced with abuse and exploitation
Smitha (not a real name), a domestic help in Delhi for 28 years, cannot forget the day when she was beaten in public by one of her employers.
The woman had accused Smitha – a dalit woman of the most discriminated against the caste of the social hierarchy rooted by Hinduism – to steal the earrings of her daughter and then refused to pay her.
“After many requests, I confronted her in public. It was then that she started abuse me and hit me. I held my hands to stop the abuses, but the guards came and dragged me out of the housing company and I locked the door, “says Smitha.
It was finally paid – 1,000 lean rupees ($ 11; £ 9) for a month of scanning, cleaning and washing dishes – after a more sympathetic family intervened on their behalf. But it was forbidden to enter the housing community and did not bother to go to the police because she thought they would not act.
Smitha’s story is one of the hundreds of thousands of stories of ill -treatment, abuse and sexual assault reported by domestic workers from India. Most are women and many are migrants in the country, belonging to despised castes.
Last month, the Supreme Court of India raised concerns about their exploitation and asked the federal government to seek to create a law to protect them from abuse.
But this is not the first time that an attempt has been made to create such a legal framework. Despite years of plea by various federal groups and ministries, no law of this type has never been adopted.
Distinct bills offered in 2008 and 2016, aimed at registering national workers and improving their working conditions, have not yet been adopted. A national policy written in 2019 to include domestic workers under existing labor laws has not been implemented.
Sonia George of the Association of Self-Employed Women (SEWA), which was part of the working group that formulated the policy project, calls it one of the “most complete policies for domestic workers”, but says that successive governments have failed to implement it.
Consequently, the vast army of domestic aids from India must rely on the employer’s goodwill for bases such as wages or leave or even a basis for respect. According to official statistics, India has 4.75 million domestic workers, including three million women. But the International Labor Organization (ILO) estimates that real numbers are between 20 and 80 million.
“We have a condescending relationship with help and not an employment relationship of work,” said Professor Neetha N of the Center for Women’s Development Studies.
“This maintains the status quo and is one of the largest obstacles to regulate and legalize interior work.”
In the current state of things, private houses are not considered as an establishment or a place of work, so that domestic work is not a matter of the competence of social protections such as the minimum wage, the right to the conditions of Sure work, the right to unionize and access to social security schemes.
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In 2018, thousands of domestic workers protested Delhi demanding a federal law to protect their rights
At least 14 Indian States, including Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Karnataka, Kerala, Meghalaya, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu, have forced the minimum wage for domestic workers and certain federal laws, such as anti- Anti-sexual harassment and child labor laws in India include national workers in their scope.
But there is very little conscience of domestic workers that they can take advantage of these provisions, says Ms. George, adding that the nature of the profession also poses challenges.
Workers are dispersed and there is no mechanism to register or even identify them because they generally do not sign any contract with their employers.
“We will have to set up systems to record domestic workers – overcoming their” invisibility “is a big step towards the regularization of the profession,” she said.
This also applies to employers. “They are completely invisible in the system and therefore escape responsibility and responsibility,” explains Ms. George.
The castes system also poses new complexities – workers in certain castes may be suitable for cleaning the toilet in a house while other slightly different caste may not do so.
In the end, the whole concept of domestic work should be redefined, says Ms. George. “Domestic work is considered an unskilled work, but this is not the case in reality. You cannot worry about a sick person or prepare a meal without being qualified,” she adds.
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Despite the vote in favor of the Convention in 2011, India does not yet comply with all its provisions
In addition to not adopting its own laws or implementing its own policy, India has not yet ratified the ratified ILO Convention – a historic international agreement which aims to guarantee that national workers have them same rights and protections as other workers. Despite the vote in favor of the Convention in 2011, India does not yet comply with all its provisions.
India has a “moral obligation” to comply with the ILO Convention, known as Ms. George. She adds that having a law will also help regulate private recruitment agencies and prevent the exploitation of domestic workers who go abroad to work.
Last year, the rich Hindu family made the headlines after a Swiss court has found them guilty of exploiting their domestic workers. The family was accused of the vulnerable Indian trafficking in Switzerland and forcing them to work in their mansion for atrociously long hours without appropriate salary. Family lawyers said they would call on the verdict.
Perhaps the simplest explanation for decades of inaction in the face of a wave of abuse lies in the conflict of interest that this settlement poses for the decision-makers of India, suggests Ms. George.
“In the end, the people of the table who have the power to sign a bill or a law are also employers of domestic workers and those who benefit from the status quo,” she said. “So, for any real change in the system, we first need a change in our state of mind.”
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