As the government eases lockdown rules, it’s a pitched battle out there between those pushing for economic survival and those who want to keep the safety cocoon intact. Sometimes it is a stalemate. Those venturing out and trying to crank up their offices and business, are finding things are just not moving.
A reflection of this today in the upper middle class world of gated communities is the Battle Royale ensuing on whether the maid and the cook can be allowed back into homes. The lady of the house is tired of the incessant cooking, washing and scrubbing. The husband has dislocated his back mopping the floors. "It is about time we got some help back, dear. A bit of risk with COVID-19 is better than the hell we are going through," he grumbles to his wife.
But the Residents' Welfare Association (RWA) or the housing society is not playing ball. The 'Mission-Begin-Again' from June 1 be damned! The collective fear of the 'infection' invading these high-walled safe havens is ensuring their gates continue to be locked for hundreds of families desperate to resume normal life.
Circle of dependency
Housing societies began with restrictions like scanning for fever with temperature guns in March. As the lockdown became tighter and panic turned to fear, societies banned cooks, maids, and plumbers as possible carriers of the virus.
Some edicts were downright weird; others were inhuman and discriminatory. Many Pune societies barred maids and technicians from using the lifts and forced them to climb stairs fearing transmission in a confined space; other imposed hefty fines on member/residents if they brought in maids after the ban.
The ousting of the maid for fear of the virus has led to the breakdown of carefully constructed household structures. It shows how dependent we are on the casual part-time services of domestic helpers. Their ban has disrupted care for the elderly and the work routines of thousands of professional and self-employed people.
After weeks of deprivation, and ultimately physical breakdown, residents have begun to clamour for ‘normalcy’ and to allow the maid and the cook in. An upscale gated community of six towers and about 650 flats in Mumbai — the Crescent Bay Apartments, in Sewree – has finally decided to lift the ban on part-time maids and other domestic help from June 13, but after laying down a strict protocol including temperature and pulse Oximeter checks.
While much of the hygiene and sanitization routine is to prevent the spread of infection by possible ‘carriers’, many housing society rules are demeaning to domestic workers. Like getting maids to strip off their clothes, take a bath, and begin work in a fresh set of clothes.
"It is strongly advised that wherever possible, please keep a set of fresh laundered clothes for the househelp which she / he can change into before starting the work. This is strongly advised for nannies/ househelps/ caregivers who come in daily but stay in one house for a longer duration and are in contact with young kids constantly," reads the Crescent Bay advisory.
Are these bans legal?
It is indeed a strange situation. The well-heeled have homes that cannot ordinarily be serviced without domestic help. On the other hand, helps are looked at as carriers of plague. It's the worst kind of class bias. Instead of developing processes which protect both the maids/domestic helps as well as the families that they work for, the uber housing societies are busy framing rules that try to balance squeezing work out of the domestic helps while finding ways of shutting them out.
Decrying the trend of housing societies asking for COVID-19 test reports of maids, some of those representing maids have rightly asked housing societies to ask flat owners to produce test reports too, to protect the domestic workers. Babli Rawat, Secretary of the Domestic Workers Federation, told squarefeet india.com that the coronavirus was not spread by the maids but by the rich who came back from foreign travel.
The big question is: Do housing societies have the legal right to create these little islands of exclusion? The Maharashtra Societies Welfare Association (MahaSewa), an apex body of housing societies, says Clause 6, sub clause (ii) of the directions of June 1 by the Maharashtra gover nment allow self-employed categories like plumbers and maids to resume work with precautions and social distancing norms.
In that light, housing societies cannot regulate services which are the concern of individual flat/home owners. Pune’s District collector Naval Kishore Ram passed an order on June 10 directing housing societies in his jurisdiction not to restrict the entry of plumbers, maids and other categories. It’s time others stepped in too, to ensure the commoner’s right to livelihood is safeguarded.
No domestic staff, insist RWAs
The collective fear of the 'infection' invading these high-walled safe havens is ensuring their gates continue to be locked for hundreds of families desperate to resume normal life.