WHEN HELPERS CRY FOR HELP

Introduction

Domestic help is a person employed to do household chores. They are commonly referred to as maids or servants too. The International Labour Organization (ILO) defines domestic work as, ‘housework such as sweeping, cleaning utensils, washing clothes, cooking, caring for children and such other work which is carried out for an employer for remuneration’.

Even though we've always been taught that 'no job is big or small, only thinking makes it so', society nevertheless views this job as inferior. They are casually treated with little respect or in some cases with no respect at all. Apart from mental abuse, many of them go through physical abuse as well. Recently many cases have been coming to light regarding the mistreatment and exploitation of domestic helpers by their employees.

How do people forget to be human to their own species? How do they forget that helpers have a soul too? They cook for you, keep your houses clean, and many times they look after your children and perform tasks that are beyond their pay. They work for long hours despite not getting fair wages. Despite being important people to keep the functioning of a house Intact, they have to go through all kinds of abuse. With a significant rise in such cases, it has become very important to acknowledge the growing issue of domestic worker abuse.

Types of Abuse

Physical abuse:- Physical abuse includes hitting, punching, strangling, restraining, pushing, and slapping.
Verbal abuse:- Verbal abuse includes name-calling, shouting, and yelling.
Psychological abuse:- It includes blaming, accusing, and restricting your freedom - like preventing you from using the phone or talking to family members, not allowing to do certain things, or allowing to do certain things only on watch, playing with emotions, etc.
Sexual abuse:- It is a forced sexual encounter of any type. This includes intercourse, inappropriate touching of any kind (even through clothing), and even forced kissing when you don't desire it.
Economical abuse:- Economic abuse is a form of abuse when the employer has control over the employee's access to economic resources, which diminishes the victim's capacity to support themselves and forces them to depend on the perpetrator financially. The domestic help in this case is not paid fair wages or sometimes not paid at all.

Poverty-stricken are distressed further

Recently, the inhuman and cruel abuse of a minor domestic help, based in Gurugram, has put the topic to light. The help, who is just a 17-year-old girl, was subjected to mental and physical harassment by her employers. According to reports the girl hails from Jharkhand's Simdega district, and started working at the residence of the couple Manish Khattar and Kamaljeet Kaur about five months ago. The sufferings and injuries of the girl, ranging from cuts to burns were discovered only after she spoke to her parents on a video call, and a case was filed against them soon after.

Uneducated and unskilled population of the country belonging to rural areas or urban poor areas dominate the domestic work industry, most of them being migrants. It is observed that children and women are the most vulnerable targets of such abuse owing to the lack of employment opportunities and education, poverty, little access to social protection, and overall ignorance by the society.

Being far away from home, it becomes difficult for them to contact their families and friends, so the chances of the sufferings endured by them being discovered become difficult. Also, some of employers restrict their employees by taking away means of contact to their families and the outer world. While male helpers perform tasks of all kinds including household and outdoor chores, female workers are assigned domestic chores in most cases. Therefore, unlike the male, female workers who live with their employers do not enjoy the freedom of stepping out of the house and asking for help. They are confined to four walls of the house and therefore are made invisible. Furthermore, the fact that some of them receive meals and shelter in exchange for the wages keeps them away from seeking help.

Women workers are subjected to sexual Abuse

The invisible and privatized nature of domestic work and harsh working conditions makes domestic workers vulnerable to sexual harassment at the workplace.

“I used to work in a house which had a huge family. I thought that it would be safe to work there. But whenever there was no one around, the old grandfather of the family would find a pretext to get closer to me and touch me. I knew that even if I told someone, no one would believe me.” – Amina (name changed), a domestic worker in Gurgaon.

Stories like that of Amina are often everyday realities of domestic workers’ work lives. Already disadvantaged by their gender, class and caste status, domestic workers are often at the receiving end of sexual abuse. This is further aggravated because of their migrant status. Migrants lack the necessary community support in a situation of duress and the clout and resources for social action. They are often illiterate and unaware of the law, and the impending threat of loss of employment and the stigma associated deters them from reporting violence. Therefore, the isolated and highly privatized nature of their workplaces and their isolation as migrant women workers puts them at high risk of sexual abuse.

Placement agencies are involved in trafficking domestic helpers

NRI Affairs Minister Punjab Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal told The Indian Express that there has been a steady rise in cases of domestic helps being trafficked to the middle east. A senior police officer said, “Most of these women are taken on transit visas for a couple of weeks and when this visa expires, their employers spend around Rs 2.50 lakh to get a work visa for them. They are not paid any salaries; instead they would have paid the agents through their noses to get the job.”

Families arrange for the money to give to the placement agencies with great hopes of better life and salary and send their beloved daughters and wives away from the country. It is only after reaching the stranger places that they realize that they have been scammed and sold by the agents. They find themselves trapped in the foreign countries with no way out and no means of communication to their own.

In a bill introduced by Congress Mp Shashi Tharoor, in 2016, Contract Registration was a feature included. It stated that "Employer or Placement Agency would have to, within two months of the commencement of the employment of a domestic worker, register the employment agreement and get it verified by either the local Panchayati Raj institution or the local urban body, the resident welfare association, or a non-profit organization working among domestic workers." But unfortunately the bill was never passed and human trafficking is still a major issue for our country.

Some workers are abused and exploited to the verge of death

Some cases of labor abuse go as far as causing their death. In November 2013, 35-year-old domestic help, Rakhi, was found dead with grievous injury marks at BSP MP Dhananjay Singh’s bungalow in New Delhi’s South Avenue. Investigations revealed that for three days Rakhi had been mercilessly assaulted with iron rods by the lawmaker and his wife. Both were arrested for the heinous crime and charged for murder and destroying evidence.

In October 2020, a minor domestic help committed suicide after being sexually abused by her employer in Hyderabad. She lived there with her sisters and the employer and his wife. The fact-finding committee was told by one of the sisters that this was not the first time that their employer took her sister to his room upstairs. On several occasions, he would be drunk and take the girl upstairs.

It's unimaginable to even think that some people and their cruel actions can be monstrous enough to lead to someone's death or suicide.

Victims and their tells

Domestic workers are abused. Some come to light and some are still living a life of hell. It pains us to just read the sickening details of the torture of the people who had to go through it. The following mentioned are only a few instances that show how the victims were humiliated and mistreated, making us doubt humanity.

Gurugram minor tortured:- The girl who is currently undergoing treatment at a hospital at Gurugram, told the officials she was beaten with rope, sticks and the accused even used blades, which led to cuts on her arms and lips. " They hit me with hot iron tongs and used lit match sticks. While washing clothes and doing chores, they made me take off my clothes. She tore the clothes that I had brought. He disrobed me and beat me with a stick. On one occasion, they tried to strangle me and threatened to kill me. I was given only one meal to eat at night - a small bowl of rice. I ate leftover food from the dustbin sometimes. I felt hopeless and was scared to tell anyone. They said I didn't do work on time, which is why they were beating me".
Trafficked to Dubai:- The victim who was trafficked to Dubai under false pretense of earning in exchange of domestic work, speaking to the Indian Express from the Indian embassy in muscat, where she had sought shelter, a 24-year-old Taran, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said she and her friend were passed down from one household to another, where their employees forced them to work for 16-17 hours in a day. "They did not pay us, saying they already paid our agents".
Security guard assaulted:- On August 29 last year, a security guard working at the Close North Apartment society in Gurugram filed an FIR after a resident of the complex violently attacked him for no reason. In viral videos of the incident, the resident, a businessman named Varun Nath, was seen violently slapping the guard, named Ashok Kumar, after getting stuck in the building’s elevator. In his fit of rage, Nath allegedly even threatened to kill the guard, who was on duty when the lift malfunctioned. Kumar claimed that Nath attacked him despite the former helping him out of the elevator. Speaking to The Quint after the incident, the 48-year-old security guard had said, "He has money and pride, and must have thought, 'What could these poor people do to me?".
Humiliated for suspicion of theft:- A 28-year-old woman was arrested and her family was booked for allegedly stripping and assaulting their 43-year-old domestic worker whom they suspected of theft. Following the assault, the victim tried to die by suicide by consuming rat poison.

Basic rights of domestic workers

Reasonable Maternity Leave: Employer-households are responsible for providing reasonable maternity leave. However, this is only applicable till a second child is born. Households must consider what is reasonable while remembering that it is a right. Three months is a minimum maternity leave that employer households must consider.
Prohibition of Child Labour: No household is allowed to employ a child (usually younger than fourteen years) for domestic work or any such ancillary or incidental work.
Fixed Working Hours: No employer-household shall force a domestic employee to work for more than nine hours in any day or for more than forty-eight hours in any week. An employee is eligible for sufficient amounts of rest, food and beverages, as demanded by the nature of the work.
Equitable Wages for Overtime: This provision mentions the calculation of wages for “overtime work”. No employee working overtime shall go unpaid for the extra hours put in.
Right to Resting Intervals: No employee shall work for a continuous period of more than five hours before a rest interval is provided. The rest interval shall not be less than half an hour (30 minutes) at any moment.
Weekly-Off: Every household, irrespective of the nature of the employment, i.e., full-time, part-time, night-shift, etc. shall provide a weekly day off without fail. Any unused leave in a week must accrue to the following week.
Minimum Wage: While there is no numerical indication to what comprises a ‘minimum wage’, it has been understood to be a wage that ensures a ‘sustainable standard of living’.
Right to Life: Under the Constitution, employer-household are under a responsibility to provide a life of dignity to their workers, which falls, broadly, under the right to life in the Constitution of India. Any unfavorable working conditions are, in essence, a breach of a fundamental right to life.
Annual & Public Leave: Employee-households are responsible to provide annual/public holidays to their workers, just as they would receive from their workplace.
Notice Period: Employee-households must provide a minimum notice period before the dismissal of their domestic workers.
Work Environment: Domestic workers are entitled to a safe, secure, and clean working environment. This is a fundamental right.
Discrimination: No domestic worker must be discriminated against because of gender, family or civil marital status, age, disability, race, sexual orientation, religion, etc.

Laws for the protection of domestic workers

1) Domestic Workers (Registration, Social Security and Welfare) Act, 2008: This act was introduced to regulate payment and working conditions and check the exploitation and trafficking of women and other young household workers. Though applicable to both men and women, it assumes significance for women due to their presence in large numbers in the occupation.

According to section 22 of the Domestic Workers (Registration Social Security and Welfare) Act, 2008, a domestic worker living in the house is entitled to annual leave with wages for at least 15 days during the year.
Section 23 of the Domestic Workers (Registration Social Security and Welfare) Act, 2008 mentions that any person who sexually harasses a domestic worker or child will be punishable with imprisonment for not less than six months and which may extend upto period of 7 years or with a fine of Rs. 50000, or both.

2) The Minimum Wages Act of 1948: The Act addresses the need for workers to receive a minimum wage. The law is subject to change by the state governments, and as a result, some state governments revised the Act to expand the definition of “worker” to include domestic employees.

3) The Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Act of 2008: This act seeks to ensure the well-being and social security of informal workers. This Act requires the formation of a national and state social security board to suggest social security plans that provide workers with different health, service, and pension benefits. Domestic care workers come under the scope of this act.

4) The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013: This act was passed by the Parliament pursuant to the Supreme Court’s guidelines in its landmark Vishakha judgment of 1997 to take preventive action against sexual harassment in the workplace. To address the complaints of female employees, this legislation ensures the creation of complaint panels and establishes a local complaint body for domestic care provider's.

Along with the above-mentioned acts, there are other laws created to safeguard the interest of workers in India. However, most of these are observed to be ineffective, as they have failed to protect the workers and provide justice to them.

What needs to be done to ensure the safety of domestic workers?

Spreading awareness: The government and social workers should launch campaigns to spread awareness and promote the rights of the workers. Awareness about the fraud and trafficking taking place in the placement agencies should be communicated to the larger public. They should be assured that their rights are protected and that they can seek legal help in case of abuse and exploitation.
Keeping an eye on placement agencies: The Contract Registration feature presented in The Domestic Workers’ Welfare Bill, 2016 in the Lok Sabha, should be taken in consideration and rules for the placement agencies should be made tough. Those responsible for bringing vulnerable girls and placing them in exploitative workplaces should be identified, tracked and punished.
Better education facilities for the poor: One of the main reasons for the abuse and exploitation of workers is lack of education, leading to lack of employment opportunities. When this happens, it forces them to stay in the abusive workplace, to meet survival needs. Better education facilities will help them out of this situation and also provide them with the perspective of fighting for their rights.
Expanding protective services for domestic workers: Workers already trapped in exploitative workplaces should be identified and rescued. There should be a proper committee formed to work and identify such cases and take action against them.
Strict action against guilty employers: Even though employers are found guilty of abusing their domestic help, it concludes to be a tough battle to bring the abused victim to justice. The families of the money often take the money and settle the claim, freeing the employers to repeat the same exploitation on someone else. Therefore, strict action should be taken against such culprits.
Creating better laws to protect workers: Despite the prevailing laws and acts, that aim towards the protection of domestic workers, cases of exploitation are on rise, mainly due to missing laws in the framework. An efficient enforcement mechanism and a legislative framework for domestic care workers are essential in India for laws meant for them to be successful. A dispute redress mechanism is also required for the regulation of the informal sector. The gaps in these existing laws should be examined thoroughly.

Conclusion

Domestic helpers have a soul too. They don't deserve beatings and abusive behavior for minor mistakes they make. They don't deserve to be mistreated after working all day and every day. They deserve to stand by their rights. They deserve to receive the money they work for. They deserve to live a normal life, one where being a maid or servant is perceived just as other jobs in the world and not something that is inferior. They deserve the same respect as everyone else.

This is an urge to each and every person reading, please respect domestic helpers and other people engaged in minor jobs around you who are working hard to make their ends meet. If you ever come across any instances of such abuse and exploitation taking place around you, inform and alert the authorities near you, immediately.

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