Laxmi Aggarwal
“I have no money. I just don’t. You can check my bank account and it doesn’t even have ₹5,000. This is how we activists live. I don’t have a regular job and all the money that my NGO gets is spent in taking care of acid attack survivors,” says Dixit, who co-owns two cafes under the brand name Sheroes, in Agra and Lucknow. Both restaurants operate on a ‘pay-as-you-please’ mode for customers. With her savings depleted and the landlord wanting to increase the rent, Aggarwal has been looking for a house. It’s not easy, she says. Potential landlords, she adds, often say “they don’t want their kids to get scared by my disfigured face”.
Aggarwal is also looking for a job. “I am educated till the 10th standard, but am a trained beautician and can communicate well. But my face becomes a hurdle when I ask for any job at any beauty parlour, as they say customers will get scared of my looks. I applied at a call centre and told them that the customers wouldn’t see my face, but they replied that ‘to get a job, I need to have a face to begin with’.”
Activists say that Aggarwal’s situation is hardly unique. According to them, the closeto-500 acid attack survivors in India get sympathy, but little monetary help. “There is so much money that gets spent on multiple corrective surgeries. Laxmi received R3 lakh in compensation from the government after a Supreme Court order, but much more went in her surgeries, and the pregnancy that followed. She got a lot of recognition when she got the award from Michelle Obama, but her award money was not enough. In India, people are willing to give awards, not money,” says Anurag Chauhan, founder of the NGO Humans for Humanity. The acid attack survivor hosted a few episodes of a TV show, and walked the ramp at London Fashion Week in 2016. “The channel paid me R38,000 for a few episodes. I felt appreciated, as they chose me over pretty anchors. I never got any payment at London Fashion Week, though. I do get invites to walk the ramp for Delhi designers but since there is no payment involved, I have stopped taking part in shows. I have a child to take care of and I need a permanent source of livelihood,” says Aggarwal.