To begin with, a disclaimer: one: I am not talking about Bangladeshi refugees in Assam, Tripura or West Bengal, two: I am not speaking in favour or against any act or issue.
The story purely reflects on the plight of Bangladeshi women who travel
thousands of miles as illegal immigrants, mostly with their husbands to big Indian cities for work. Making their way through jungles, crossing the IB border by bribing the BSF guards, the rate is 13 thousand rupees per person. With the help of middlemen, they reach Kolkata and get into a train to make it to cities like Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore where men work as construction labour and women work in residential areas as housemaids.
Most of them leave their children behind in Bangladesh. They earn here, save some and send some money to the caretakers of their children. Their children study in English medium schools' back home in Bangladesh. Even if the child is born during their stay in India, there are no intentions to keep the child here, as it would increase their cost of living. They visit their country only once every two or sometimes three years. Mobile phones and what's app have shrunk the world, but the fact is their kids grow up without the physical presence of their parents.
These Bangladeshi couples mostly stay in the outskirts of the satellite towns around the metro cities. These women work for 14 hours
a day going to 8 to 9 houses on an average, earning anywhere between 20 to 30 thousand a month. Cleaning, Sweeping, Cooking are their primary job functions. They by far the most diligent workers I have come across. Most of them want to learn and upgrade their style of living to what they see here in India.
We hired our first Bangladeshi maid Noori, in 1998, in my parent's house in Delhi. She wanted her son to be an engineer, so she came to India alone, after her husband had passed away. She stayed in Seelampur, Delhi and used to travel all the way to Anand Vihar for work. Short, fair and underweight, Noori wore salwar kameez to mix well in the general public of Delhi. Her biggest problem was, language she could hardly understand Hindi and the Bengali she spoke was difficult for us to understand. For about a year, our conversation with her was two to three words and a lot of sign language. Noori would send more than 50% of what she earned to her son, who lived in a hostel in his school in Dhaka. In the early years of her stay in India, I remember there use be raids in Seelampur after any unrest or blast in any part of India. Noori would stay back in our colony and wait for things to normalise. During this time, my mom would strike little conversations with her, Noori would speak slowly and try to use Hindi words, while mom would speak loudly in broken sentences trying to make her understand. I would have fun listening to it. All the raids and initial trouble did not deter Noori from her goal, she wanted her son to study well, which he did. About 3years ago he completed his education in computers. Though he is still looking for a job. Noori, who was waiting to finally reunite with him, continues to work at my parent's place in Delhi. She has just recovered from jaundice, and her landlord in Sleempur asked her to move out due to the CAA NRC issue. All the families that Noori worked for, collectively paid her hospital bills and have helped her find accommodation nearby. Now she is waiting for her son to get a job so that she can go back Home.
My second Bangladeshi maid was hired in Kharghar, Mumbai, in 2007.
Dolly, had three children, two girls and one boy. She used to stay in a
village near Kharghar with her husband, sister and brother in law. Tall, dusky and very hard working Dolly picked up Hindi very quickly, and she would love wearing churidar kurta's she said, she felt free in it. Her husband used to work as labour in Panvel. Kharghar is full of middle and upper-middle-class professionals. As the area developed, the demand for maids grew.
Our third Bangladeshi maid was our cook, Sweety, Dolly introduced her to me after I gave birth to my daughter. Sweety came from a relatively affluent family in Bangladesh. Fair, round face, fit and rather pleasant to look at Sweety was here to earn money to build her business and marry her daughters. She wanted to start a fish farm in her land. Land on which her family pursed agriculture. She had 3 daughters and was trying for a son when she began working at my house. Her husband was a lazy fellow and didn't go out to do much work, but Sweety being a cook would earn a lot. Even Dolly's husband was a notorious character. Both these women would work through the day, and one could see them managing
work here and demands of family and children back in Bangladesh.
Many times I could figure out they have had a fight with their husbands, Fights, in which they got beaten up. When it would go beyond tolerance, they would cry and share their stories with me. Living away from children, working for hours with just two days off in a month, sometimes they would take glucose drip and come to work, with all this also life was peaceful for them till Kharghar got its new big police station in 2014.
The police station got more police personnel for the area. The raids which were few and rare became frequent. Every now and then one would hear about police doing night raids and picking up a bunch of Bangladeshi immigrants. Then, they would pay about anywhere between 5 to 50 thousand rupees per person and come back to work a few days later.
Dolly escaped two such raids while she was working with me, in the third one her husband got arrested. She did not have enough money to get him out. It took her about two months to get that money and facilitate his release. After which, the family decided to leave.
One year later Dolly came back, this time alone to earn some more money as her daughters were now of marriageable age (14 and 15). She worked through the day and till late evening, frequently changed the location of her stay to avoid police. After completing her work in all the houses, she would come to my house clean up, change clothes and then take care of my daughter as I would finish my office work. I was lucky to get a 6-month half-day office after my daughter was born. Dolly completed her second stint of about 2 years, once the wedding dates
were fixed, she went back home. Hopefully for good.
An illegal immigrant in India is a foreigner who has entered India either without valid documents or who initially came with valid documents but overstayed beyond the permit.
My cook Sweety had come in the right way but stayed back. Also, it was not the first time she was here, she was born in India and had spent a few growing up years in Mumbai with her parents. That's why her Hindi was excellent, and she could even understand Marathi. She was professional in her approach and enjoyed cooking. She would try new dishes, learnt different Indian styles, would try to blend them with her style. Mostly dressed up in crisp salwar kurta, Sweety would leave the kitchen spic and span after work. She got her Adhaar, pan card and a bank account in place, so she hardly had to face the police ever. Her personal life was in doldrums, though. Her husband indulged in an extramarital affair here in India. When she got to know about it, she sat at home, refusing to go to work, he would beat her for doing this. One day after a scuffle she came crying to my place, with wounds on her face and marks on her back, she was beaten up with a leather belt. I took her to the doctor, after which I called her husband and threatened him that I would get him arrested.
A few months later, Sweety was ready to leave for Bangladesh. She was pregnant with her fourth baby. Being extremely goal-oriented, in her work stint of about 5 years here she constructed her house, made her fish farm and got her eldest daughter married back home, all with the money she earned. Nearly a year later, I got to know that her fourth child was also a girl who didn't survive. Sweety is back in Kharghar this time alone to earn more so that she can get her other two daughters married.
My fourth Bangladeshi maid - Panna, what an amazing girl, she is not even 20, small, swift, and already has three kids. The youngest one was less than a year old when she started working for me, he was born here. Her husband though much older than her, would take care of her. Her life became miserable after the day Amit shah announced a nationwide NRC and exclusion of Muslims from CAA. As protests grew, the situation became tense.
Some of these women working in our area would meet up every evening to get the latest update. Police started to crack down in regions like Mera road, Bhayender, Panel and Navi Mumbai. There were reports that Bangladeshi workers are being arrested from outside the housing societies in Mera Road. Rumours that police are giving 5000 rupees to those who will inform them about the Bangladeshi families in the vicinity, disturbed them more.
Amid all this Panna with her family decided to leave for Bangladesh. They were told that Bangladesh is sealing its borders so they should reach their village before that happens. Panna is not the only one, others have also packed their bags and have left for Bangladesh. After 4 days of intense travel, from train to bus to walk to the border and through the forest, with a one-year-old child, Panna managed to reach her village. Her mother, who has stayed back to work for some more days, before she packs her bags, sounded relieved when she called to inform me that Panna has reached home safely.
There are certain Myths about these immigrants that I would like to break here,
Myth 1. They come to India and eat into opportunities that Indians are supposed to get.
No, there is enough demand for a workforce in the jobs they do. If we speak about housework only most of the Indian maids have hang-ups in doing a lot of work that these Bangladeshi maids agree to do. Also, since the day, these maids have started leaving. There is a maid crisis in the area. Now don't give me an argument that in the US and Europe people do their own chores, we all know life is different there.
Myth 2. An IIT kid argued with me about how Bangladeshi immigrants are eating into our resources.
Now I understand that the pressure on the system, water and electricity, increases but they also contribute to our consumption economy. They are not getting any aids, and they cannot take benefits of any government facilities. If only they could come here and work with a working visa like our educated engineers do when they go to the US etc. things would be different for them. The problem is these people get permit only for 3months which is not enough to pursue any job.
Also, most of them do want to eventually go back to Bangladesh. Bangladesh is one of the fastest-growing economies of the region, with the highest population of freelance IT professionals and educated skilled labour below the age of 25. All these factors have led to a decline in the number of immigrants coming to India for work.