Alleviation: An International Journal of Nutrition, Gender & Social Development, ISSN 2348-9340 Volume 5, Number 5 (2018):
© Arya PG College, Panipat & Business Press India Publication, Delhi
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Unnoticed Plight of Female Domestic Workers in Odisha: Explaining the Silence

Rajadarshini Patra
PhD Research Scholar
School of Women’s Studies
Utkal University, Odisha, India
Email: rajadarsinihere@gmail.com

Introduction

‘Their journey is long and hard’, ‘they work in isolation’, ‘they are most vulnerable workers’, ‘they are an invisible section of the unorganized work force’- these are the basic features of domestic workers. Domestic worker is a person who is employed in any household on a temporary or permanent basis to do the household work. Domestic work is predominantly a female’s work, although men are working in this sector. This paper has focused on female domestic workers’ problems which are unnoticed and invisible to the society. Women domestic workers are referred to as ‘servants’ and ‘maids’ which has resulted in the feelings of insecurity and inferiority. This has further added to the undignified status awarded to the services provided by them. The supply of domestic work absorbs the uneducated and unskilled part of the population which has limited job opportunities.
Domestic workers are helping households manage responsibilities of child care, cooking, and cleaning. They also free up their employers to participate in the workforce themselves and provide care for the industrialized world’s increasingly aging population. Domestic work is the largest sector of female employment all over the world, yet it is extremely undervalued and unprotected by labour law. Exasperating this situation, the estimated one hundred million domestic workers world-wide have until recently hardly been organized as workers (Johnstone 2013). It seems to be the destiny of significantly huge number of women workers in India who seek employment opportunities in urban sector, often rendering an invisible workforce who are not paid well and deprived of rights to ensure decency in work. Their contribution to urban gross development product and some of the “difficult to replace” nature of jobs where they are engaged, makes them an integral productive economic agent of the urban economy. Despite this, millions of women across the country take up domestic work since decades in view of limited options available to them in order to provide a living for themselves and their families. Working in the unregulated domain of a private home, mostly without the protection of national labour legislation, allows for female domestic workers to be maltreated by their employers with impunity. Women are often subjected to long working hours and excessively arduous tasks. They may be strictly confined to their places of work. The domestic workforce is excluded from labour laws that look after important employment-related issues such as conditions of work, wages, social security, provident funds, old age pensions and maternity leave (Anonymous 2007)). Domestic work is a low paying activity. Domestic workers’s salaries are often far below the minimum wage. Domestic workers suffer from poor working conditions. Having its socio-economic invisibility and the accompanying low social status, their work is often exploitative. Their work remains invisible all time. They have to face lots of problems at workplace, home and community.
Domestic work as an economic activity is too vast and employs too many to remain unregulated. They are not even recognized as workers. Their work — cooking, cleaning, dish-washing, baby-sitting — is not recognized as work by the state.
There has been various studies undertaken focusing on the status of women domestic workers. The present study was undertaken to have brief information on domestic work as an unorganized labour force, to study on the invisible sight of domestic worker’s life (past and present) and to analyze the existing laws and legal provisions for domestic workers.
Methodology
The present research study has been conducted by using observation, personal interview through questionnaire and group discussion.
Results and Discussion
According to the present study, domestic workers suffer from poor working conditions. Having its socio- economic invisibility and the accompanying low social status, their work is often exploitative. Their work remains invisible all time. They are facing problems at workplace, home and community. Exclusion from key labour protections places them at the mercy of their employer regarding their health, security, and terms of employment.
Case Studies
A woman’s entry into this profession out of family disturbance: A woman of 33 years of age had chosen this profession because her husband left her. She was educated but got married to an uneducated man. After few years of marriage, she found that her husband had extra marital affair with another lady. He left her and started staying in another place. He had taken her educational certificates so that she could not find her source of income on her own. She used to stay in a slum in Bhubaneswar in a rented house. She said that- “I do not want to work as a domestic worker as I am educated but my situation forced me to do so. My daughter is doing her study, all her expenditures are dependent on me.” Besides this I have to pay house rent.
Communal riots push her out of native place: ‘Houses were burning’, ‘own people and relatives were killed by other people’, ‘girls were taken away by unknown people’ and so on’- this was the opinion of women domestic workers. They ran to the city for safety of life during communal riots in Kandhamal district of Odisha. It can be said that they were forcefully migrated to the city without any planning for livelihood and future settlement. For immediate income, they had chosen to work in others’ house as it was easily available. Through their friends and relatives, they entered to this profession and till date, they are in this sector and facing problems of insufficient income and no house of their own.
Lack of recognition: They also enter into this profession due to desertion, children’s’ negligence, absence of partner, poverty in village, outcaste from the community and so many. They have to manage two households, even more than that while neglecting own children and family. Their satisfaction and needs are not visible to anyone. In this work sector; no written contracts, no social benefits, no health insurance, job insecurity, no work–no pay and total dependency on the employer’s goodwill.
Legal Provisions for Domestic Workers
• On 16th June 2011, delegates of International Labour Organisation (ILO) adopted Convention on Domestic Workers` and a supplementary Recommendation. The Convention recognized domestic work as ‘work’ and also formulated international standards for decent working conditions for domestic workers.
• Rights Equality Solidarity Power Europe Co-operation Today (RESPECT 2009) Network Campaigning for the Rights of Migrant Domestic Workers in Europe and International, facilitates the empowerment of migrant domestic workers working in private households, as main actors in the campaign for their rights as a sector and the importance of strengthening the immigration and labor rights of migrant domestic workers.
• International Domestic Workers Network (IDWN) is a first-ever formal federation of domestic workers. It is made up of domestic workers’ organizations and other trade unions around the world.
• A task force of Ministry of Labour and Employment submitted its final report on domestic workers on 12th September 2011. The Act covered domestic workers but many provisions like maternity benefits and disability cover remained only on paper.
• The National Platform for Domestic Workers was created in 2012 and comprises of several domestic workers unions and member-based organizations from around the country that are demanding Comprehensive Legislation for Domestic Workers.
• The government has sought to protect the domestic workers through a rights based approach. There are legal provisions for the protection of human rights of domestic workers. Besides these, in India there is lacuna in existing labor legislation to meet the needs of the domestic workers. Domestic workers are not included in labor laws due to the constraints in the definitions of the “workman”, “employer” or “establishment” (SEWA 2014).
Legal provisions are limited to only pen and paper, not useful to the service of domestic workers. India has only two laws that, in a roundabout way i.e. The Unorganized Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008, (UWSSA) and the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013. While the former is a social welfare scheme, the latter aims to protect working women in general. Neither of these recognizes domestic helps as rights-bearing workers. Yet this recognition is a necessary pre-condition for state regulation. Strangely enough, it exists in the form of a draft National Policy for Domestic Workers. This policy not only calls for promoting awareness of domestic work as a “legitimate labour market activity”, but also recommends amending existing labour laws to ensure that domestic workers enjoy all the labour rights that other workers do.
Conclusions
Domestic workers have generally not been fortunate enough to enjoy decent working conditions. On the contrary, they are amongst the most vulnerable and exploited workers at the lowest end of the wage distribution, working the longest hours often under conditions resembling slavery. In fact, domestic workers are often exempted from labour laws and social security provisions. They are never capable of individual and collective bargaining.
References
Anonymous (2007) National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganized Sector 2007: 86.
Anonymous (2013) ILO (a) Global Momentum Grows for Domestic Workers Legislation.Available at https://www.ilo.org/global
Anonymous (2007) National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganized Sector (NCEUS) Exclusion of Domestic Work. Report on Condition of Work and Promotion of Livelihoods in the Unorganized Sector, Planning Commission Government of India, New Delhi.
Anonymous (2013) ILO (b) Domestic Workers Across the World Global and Regional Statistics and the Extent of Legal Protection. Geneva: International Labour Office: 8-63.
Johnstone L (2013) Organising Domestic Workers: For Decent Work. ILO Convention No. 189: 1-13.
SEWA (2014) Domestic Workers’ Laws and Legal Issues in India. WIEGO Law and Informality: 1-10.