Chunnilal and family
From the book An Open Market for Informal Workers: The Precarious Labour Chowks of Delhi
We met a family of eight from Mirchwara village in Lalitpur, Uttar Pradesh. Pramod and Chunnilal are brothers who came here with their wives and children, and a distant relative. They have three more brothers. The eldest one had migrated to Indore to find work in the construction industry, while the younger brothers stayed back at home with their aged parents. Chunnilal has been coming to the chowk for the past 11 years. In the earlier days, the spot where they wait for work was a little further away from the present place, and it was called Nizamuddin Chowk instead of Sarai Kale Khan chowk. His wife and brother have been coming with him to the Sarai Kale Khan labour chowk for a few years now. The brother’s wife, however, is fairly new to the city.
They belong to the Prajapati/Kumhar caste of Madhya Pradesh whose traditional occupation is pottery. Thakurs, Kurmis, and Yadavs are the land-owning castes in their village. The rest of the castes (Ahirwars, Kushwahas, Dhimars, Kadayyas and Kumhars) migrate to different parts of India for work. Some of the Kushwahas also own land. According to Chunnilal, the Dhimars (traditionally boatmen) were the first to lose their livelihood and migrate. They do not own land. Kumhars, a scheduled caste, also own very little land. Thakurs, the biggest landowners, lease out their land to other ‘lower’ castes. Like many others, their village has been facing acute drought for the past few years. Since most farmers are tenants of the land-owning castes, the benefits of the drought packages are received largely by the Thakurs and other upper castes. According to the family, the extinction of traditional occupations, landlessness, and drought forced two-thirds of their village to migrate to the cities.
Their father was a potter. He used to collect clay from the riverside, mould it and make pottery wares for a living. When the brothers were younger, the pottery trade and the yield from the three bigha land they shared with their father’s family, was sufficient for survival. However, the father developed a neurological disorder and stopped making earthenware. None of the siblings had learnt the craft because it needs more effort than daily wage work. The clay has to be collected and carried to their houses, mixed proportionately and once the pots are moulded, they are baked in a kiln to firm them. The last stage is risky; the success rate is usually 50-50 because the vessel may break due to over/under heating. No one except their chacha (uncle) does this work in the family anymore. Prior to moving to Delhi for construction work, the siblings were involved in casual stone mining work in their village. The stones are mined from the common land in the village and are used to build houses. Chunnilal, the eldest of the brothers, had blisters all over his palms because of this work. According to his wife, the work they did in the village used to fetch them Rs. 150–200 a day.
When we asked whether they were beneficiaries of any state programs or schemes, the couple told us that they were also doing MGNREGA work in their village. Even though they finished 90 days of work, they had only received the wages for 45 days thus far. The wages get credited directly in their account.
They came to Delhi for the first time along with their three children two months before the interview. Their eldest child is nine years old and goes to school, so they left her in an uncle’s care back in the village. When they first arrived, they got work immediately at a construction site near the Gurgaon Bus Stand. They thought that they would not have to wait at all this time around either. However, when we met with the family, which was around midnight, they had been waiting all day, having been unable to find a thekedar as it was raining. The jhuggi, which the thekedar had provided to them, was relatively more comfortable for them than sleeping in the street.
Chunnilal’s wife cooks for the entire family and also works at the construction site. Like all other women, her day starts at 5 AM. She has to cook for the family, wash clothes, clean utensils, feed her children, before she leaves for work at 8 AM. She was four months pregnant at the time of the interview. She had miscarried a few months prior when something fell on her head after she fell down at the construction site. They went to the nearby hospitals and enquired about whether they could demand compensation some way. The jhuggi that the contractor had arranged for them did not have an electricity supply or gas connection. They get a kerosene lantern to use at night. Food is cooked on the chulha (stove). They get subsidized food grains from the ration shop back home. The shopkeeper is particularly helpful in their village: if they cannot collect the ration in the same month, they are allowed to collect it the next month. The family carries their allotted food grains and some essential utensils to the city when they migrate. It takes 12 hours by train to reach Nizamuddin Railway Station. They travel with cooked food that can last them the day or two they might have to wait for the thekedar. As they get paid only after working for a particular period, the grains and spices they carry from their village ensure their food security for the first few days at work.
The wages for men and women are unequal in practice. Even though Chunnilal and his wife are aware of their right to be paid equally, they do not want to sabotage their livelihood by asking for higher wages. ‘My wife works more than me. Even then, she gets paid Rs. 250 a day and I get 300. We need to survive somehow, so we have learned to be happy with whatever little we get.’
They have to take days off work if they fall ill at the site. Chunnilal’s brother had a fever for a few days. His wife, who is also a worker, had to stay back to take care of him. A resident near their worksite directed him to a government hospital in Gurgaon, where he got a consultation with the doctor for free.
The debt crisis that their entire region goes through was evident from their experience. Each adult member of the family has a loan of at least Rs. 40,000 on them, which they borrowed at a monthly interest rate of five percent. Chunnilal himself pays Rs. 2,600 just as interest every month on the loan he has taken. When he has to pay back the loan, he borrows money from someone else. This is more or less the way every migrant worker from his village manages their debt. When we asked him whether he has to furnish any land documents against the loan, he told us he does not have any in his name. The lack of ownership of property is one reason why they mostly rely on informal money lenders.
Other than NREGA, the only welfare scheme he has been able to avail is the Ujjwala Yojna, through which they received a gas stove and gas cylinders. Since the sarpanch is a Thakur, most of the schemes do not reach them, as Chunnilal’s wife explains, because of the prevailing caste biases in accessing government schemes.
When we asked them about their plans to go back, they said they will when it starts raining in their village, as people will resume agricultural work once water is available.
Jenny Sulfath 