Women’s biggest worry: A runaway maid
Guess what is the biggest cause of concern among the women in my neighbourhood? No, it is not the nuclear weapons in the arsenal of North Korea or a spate of suicides by our farmers or the GST or the menace of ‘fake babas’ or the rising air pollution caused by crackers and paddy straw burning or even the safety of our kids in schools.
Their biggest worry is if their house maid proceeds on leave, who will mop the floors or scrub pots and pans in the kitchen? Courtesy, the economic disparity, we, the self-proclaimed elite class, always feel entitled to services of a house help. Depending upon our requirement at any given time, each household is likely to have one or many from among a nanny, a housekeeper, cook, cleaner, laundry maid, gardener, chauffer, gatekeeper and even a person to wash our cars! Generally, richer the family, the larger is the retinue of servants they have. The ubiquitous servants have been part of Hindi movies where they are stereotyped as ‘Ramu Kaka’ with a kitchen towel thrown over his shoulder or smartly dressed servant on buddy terms with Salman Khan.
Currently, the maids have made appearance in TV serials and advertisements also. Our dependence on servants was aptly portrayed in a film of yesteryears,‘Bawarchi’ , wherein when a servant offers himself for a job in a chaotically run household, the satirical old man in the family announces to his not-so-efficient daughters in law, ‘tumhare liye to bhagwan aaya hai’…
I have recently read two books about domestic servants. ‘The Help’ written by Kathyrn Stockett deals with domestic help scenario in southern states of US in the 1960s. Interestingly, the attitude of white employers towards their black maids bears uncanny similarity with the attitude we have towards our maids. For example, maids in the book are required to use plates and cutlery set aside for them and forbidden to use the bathrooms of their white employers. They were always suspected to have stolen cutlery or other valuables. We may not acknowledge, but these are issues in our homes as well. ‘Maid in India’ by Tripti Lahiri depicts the current domestic help scenario in urban India and in a way holds mirror to ourselves and unmasks our hypocrisies. For example, ‘people who claim to be free of caste bias don’t allow women who clean bathrooms to cook for them, citing hygiene’. Both these books stir your conscience as they highlight the servants point of view on the unwritten rules that govern interaction between the lady of the house and servants.
It has been rightly observed that the rich owe their luxurious lifestyle to availability of a large number of poor. Currently, for a working woman, given the pressures of our hectic work schedule, our labour and time intensive cooking style, dusty environment which makes it mandatory to broom and wipe furniture every day, having a household help is a necessity. I am lucky to have a team of efficient maids who help in smooth running of my household. But with the availability of alternate options, such as jobs at shopping malls, boutiques or factories, it is getting difficult to find reliable house- help. Therefore, more households now own time and labour-saving gadgets. Processed foods (albeit not so healthy!) adorn the shelves in grocery stores. Home delivery of cooked meals, groceries and other goods has become commonplace. All these are attempts to fill the gaps left by vanishing servants.
My biggest bugbear has been aptly conveyed in this punch line by H H Munro (Saki) which was first published in 1904 and is still relevant: ‘The cook was a good cook, as cooks go; and as cooks go she went’. And when this happens with me, there I start all over again, enquiring from friends and neighbours about a suitable cook willing to work for our family!
‘MAID IN INDIA’ BY TRIPTI LAHIRI DEPICTS THE CURRENT DOMESTIC HELP SCENARIO IN URBAN INDIA AND IN A WAY HOLDS MIRROR TO SOCIETY AND UNMASKS OUR HYPOCRISIES