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Domestic helps to fight for rights
A day will come soon for the city when a housewife will have to pay minimum wages to the domestic servants for restricted hours of work and think twice to remove them from service. They have to sanction weekly offs and paid maternity leaves.This is going to be reality when over 3,000 domestic helps will have their first general body meeting during the first week of May and a state-wide meeting o
Visakhapatnam: A day will come soon for the city when a housewife will have to pay minimum wages to the domestic servants for restricted hours of work and think twice to remove them from service. They have to sanction weekly offs and paid maternity leaves.This is going to be reality when over 3,000 domestic helps will have their first general body meeting during the first week of May and a state-wide meeting on June 16 which is observed as the World Domestic Helpers Day.
Highlights:
- 3,000 domestic helps to convene their first general body meeting in the first week of May and a state-wide meeting on June 16 which is observed as the World Domestic Helpers Day
- A group of women met at Peda Jalaripeta under the leadership of Sister Angela Mary who runs a voluntary organisation
- The women members narrated their problems at the preliminary meeting
On Tuesday a group of women, taking permission from their employers met at Peda Jalaripeta under the leadership of Sister Angela Mary who has a voluntary organisation at Arilova in the city.
“These women never went to school, began their employment at a tender age of 14 due to the alcoholic violence at homes. They are exploited by their men and their employers though they shed blood working throughout their lives,” said Angeal Mary.Talking to this correspondent at a meeting venue here on Monday, she said it was high time they formed into a union and asserted for their rights for minimum wages and rational working hours as per the law.A post graduate in social work from Andhra University, Mary said the tale of every woman in this fishing village of Peda Jalaripeta was the same.
There was no childhood during their childhood. Unlike other children they never went to school, began working as domestic helps soon after attaining puberty and continue to work even after their marriage.“Their husbands, who venture out into the sea, never give them money to run the house. They spend entire earnings on drinking alcohol and most of the time demand money from the women during off season to consume alcohol,” she said.Mary said she will not stop at achieving the minimum wages. The union will launch anti-liquor campaign in the hamlets and send children to the schools so that they do not end up like their mothers.
She added that a self-help group has been launched recently which will be integrated with the union. Help from women organisations and trade unions will also be sought, she added.The women members narrated their problems at the preliminary meeting. The seniors among them feared that if they formed into union, housewives might get scared and shoo them away. “But we are determined to form union,” P Narsa, Gowri and Swarna said.
By KMP Patnaik
