After the implementation of the lockdown, many domestic workers have lost their jobs and in a lot of cases, even salaries for months they did work. This is the case for some of the maids in Noida, as well.
Some of them are now sharing their stories, which are heartbreaking to say the least.
Just pathetic. How can they blame maids for spread of virus? They may have got infected because of people who fly like them who brought it in India.
— Durbeen Doctor (@doctorhitesh) May 26, 2020
For instance, Anju Bibi, who lives in Noida Sector 75 and works in 77. In an interview given to The Indian Express, she said:
When the lockdown was implemented, I was given Rs 1,600 and told to leave. Now, no one is hiring. We do not know when we will get jobs again.
The situation is so bad that some of them have even resorted to begging. “Someone suggested this (begging for food) a month ago. This has become my livelihood now,” said Posha Poonam Posaha who worked in Sector 40.
And these are just two of the many cases in and around the capital city. Another domestic worker from Lajpat Nagar told The Indian Express that her husband had to be admitted to the hospital because of dengue amid the lockdown, and that it was nightmare after being fired from job and paid only for the month of March.
‘We need milk for our children’: India’s domestic workers – who cook & clean for the nation’s affluent families – struggle to feed their kids as employers stop paying them. They can’t work (or aren’t wanted due to covid fears). They have no rights to protect them. @divyaconnects pic.twitter.com/nReF5oYSE8
— Nicola Careem (@NicolaCareem) May 24, 2020
Finding new jobs at this time is also not an option so most of them are left to the mercy of fate and strangers.
A truly sad state of affairs.
You can read the whole story here.
