The poverty trap

The daily struggle seems never-ending for the poor in Chennai. Even the most elementary civic services and rudimentary health care are not theirs to demand as a right, says VISA RAVINDRAN.

HE WHO has no bread has no authority, says a Turkish proverb, and it is nowhere more clearly illustrated than in the daily struggle of the urban poor to get their due. Even the most elementary civic services and rudimentary healthcare are not theirs to demand as a right. Palms have to be greased at every turn and while rosy Government schemes and climbing human development indices paint a pretty picture, the real life stories of housemaids and other domestic service providers in Chennai (and perhaps also in other metros) reflect a heartless civic system that fails to fulfil the purpose of its existence.

I am referring here of course, to the essential services that we all need - the police, the postal department, hospitals and the public distribution system whose smooth and corruption-free working is necessary for daily living.

The various instances that were brought to my notice illustrate not only the Turkish proverb quoted but underline the tremendous effort required to sensitise public servants to their responsibilities.

Manga is a domestic servant, abandoned within a few years of marriage by her husband, who eloped with a younger woman. Her son, Raja, is the hope of her life.

Raja, however, would rather watch movies or play video games well into the night than work at his lessons, and is therefore repeating the seventh class at school.

Manga works in three houses to earn enough to send him to a good school rather than the one run by the Government. To augment her earnings, she wanted to get the Rs. 200 monthly allowance from the State Government given to widows and abandoned women. In order to set the machinery moving for this and also to get a ration card for herself, she paid a party functionary (the political colour is irrelevant here because it is the clout of affiliation and a certain skill to negotiate the mazes of officialdom that matter) Rs. 2000.

After several false starts, he delivered the goods but she had to enlist the support of a worldly-wise male relative to chase the fixer into performing. And then, to make sure that the allowance is given to her when she is at home and not away at work, she has to pay the postman ten rupees every month. This sum varies according to the size of payments and money orders, says her neighbour Clara, another maid servant. Being unmarried and living in a joint family where there are more earning members and a prosperous brother who sends sums like Rs 1,000 from time to time, the going rate is higher.

When burglars broke into her dwelling place in the slum and took away all her vessels and clothes, Vasantha was told no FIR could be filed unless she paid Rs. 300 first. "Ethana panam kondu vandirukke?" (how much money have you brought?) is the first question we are asked so we don't even bother to report thefts anymore," said Rosy and Kamala who were her neighbours in the hovels along the Cooum for a while and then returned to their village unable to continue life in the city.

Alice spoke of the daily battering her doors received at the hands of drunken men demanding sexual favours just because they believed they could get away with it when a single woman lived with only her old mother for company.

And Mary, another abandoned woman with three sons who worked for me a couple of years, never failed to emphasise the fact that though poor, she worked hard and didn't stray from the straight and narrow path, managing always to imply, not so subtly, that it was my duty to reward virtue as often as possible with whatever she needed.

Other servants were instructed not to inform me that she often took money from me for something that she was already getting free from the Government or the municipal corporation, like tiles to replace the ones that the cyclone had blown away, for instance.

Does one burn with the anger caused by the discovery of such exploitation or curse the helplessness of poverty compounded by the pressures of surviving in a system so entrenched in corruption that any well-meaning measure to alleviate it is choked immediately?

Recent papers report that a woman in her twenties had to stagger out of the labour room to plead with her parents, "Please give them (the ayahs) some money.

They are torturing me. They even hit me on the thighs." She then delivered a baby boy, had to shell out another Rs. 150 and her parents were warned by other new mothers that they would be poorer by at least another Rs. 1,500 before their daughter and grandchild were discharged.

The fleecing by ayahs, wardboys and liftmen is not a new phenomenon and periodical inspections and inquiries do not seem to stem the rot effectively.

Officials turn a blind eye to avoid confrontation and the public continue to pay a heavy price.

Raji, who works as a masseuse, complains how nurses in public and private hospitals catering to lower income groups, do not even divulge the gender of newborns unless they are tipped heavily.

A sidelight on the issue is that when a boy is born, more money has to be parted with than in the 'tragic event' of a girl's entry into the family.

I have personally experienced anger and frustration in the poshest of medical centres, where before wheeling in a family member after serious surgery, wardboys pause meaningfully at the door to collect their tips, and only then transfer the patient to the bed. Even in the darkest hours of medical crises, one is expected to have change in all denominations at hand to disperse liberally to the minions whose co-operation is required for smooth passage in hospitals of all types.

My friend can never forget that an hour before her father breathed his last, she had to get down on her hands and knees to wipe the bathroom floor whose wetness could cause a fall and endanger patients further - the ayah whom she approached said she was required to do it only twice a day. When I told the staff of a well-known orthopaedist's clinic that the floor at the entrance was wet, the roomful of patients with broken bones was not enough reason for them to break the chain of command: it was still wet when I left half an hour later.

Just one day's readers' mail on civic problems (in newspapers) lists several problems and some solutions - the footpath on either side of the Saidapet subway on the market end is occupied by vegetable and fruit vendors causing great hardship to the public amid the jostling crowds in the limited space while an adjacent market complex built recently lies unused; erratic power supply in the Avadi area interrupts everything, from household work and children's study/homework to entertainment and mosquito- free sleep and rest: hardships of commuters in the Perambur area; the unreliable telephone service in Virugambakkam; the total lack of maintenance of the Mylapore crematorium in contrast to the one in Gujarat, well-maintained with beautiful trees and plants that the reader had admired.

Most readers will have several similar plaints to add about the problems of daily living in other areas but isn't it high time citizens organised themselves better to demand better service and maintenance of public places and authorities moved to function more effectively?

Power corrupts the few while weakness corrupts the many, goes the saying, but power and weakness together seem to have reduced life to an obstacle race in a city festering with garbage mounds, rotten rice, dry taps and the 'baksheesh' culture that shamelessly requires constant rewards even for the performance of duly-assigned duties.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Features
Previous : Footloose and fat free!
Next     : Mouth-watering menu