Points on sweepers in pandemic
Answers
As the backbone of structured urban living, these unseen workers keep the wheels turning amid the coronavirus outbreak
Tajinder Singh Tirsewal’s day starts at 6 am, collecting trash from the doorsteps of over 150 households in a building complex in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai. The doubled workload is shared by the 45-year-old’s wife Rajni and brother-in-law Ajay, as three other staffers in the team went back to their respective villages. The trio then moves on to the task of sweeping the complex premises and sanitising the elevators in each wing.
On being asked if he is scared to continue working during the outbreak, a perspiring Singh said through his mask, while gliding a cleaning cloth along the railing bar in the lobby: “There is a lot of fear, of course. We collect the garbage of so many households without knowing who went out and who is healthy. But the building has given us a livelihood for nine years now; we could not just leave it when such a situation arose.” Singh hails from Karnal district in Haryana and is the eldest of three brothers; his brothers back home have been out of work since the small manufacturing unit where they were employed had to shut shop in April.
Since the beginning of the nationwide lockdown, the family of four, including Singh’s 14-year-old son Pawan, have been living in a small room in the complex. Singh’s son has been undergoing treatment for epilepsy since age 10, and the lockdown has posed difficulties in getting proper treatment and medication.
As urban professionals across fields brace for work from home to become the new norm in the Covid-19 era, working remotely remains an impossibility for sanitisation and cleaning workers, security guards, local store staff, logistical staff and all those who compose the basic structure for systematic urban living.
Duty calls
As metro cities see a considerable surge in the shift to online shopping for essentials during the lockdown, it is the logistics workforce that make this new normal possible, including the delivery men who are at high exposure points every day.
Dildar Ali, a 44-year-old delivery agent working with grocery e-retail company Grofers for two years, has been delivering groceries in and around the Grant Road area of Mumbai during the lockdown. Along with the long hours of shift, Ali is observing Roza (fast) every day, in the holy month of Ramadan, during which he cannot consume food or water from dawn till dusk.
On being asked if he’s worried about his safety, going out to work every day during the lockdown, said Ali with a sense of responsibility evident in his voice: “If I get scared and sit at home, who will fulfil my duty? You get your groceries and I get to keep my livelihood, it’s only fair.”
Ali resides in Byculla with his wife Hafiza, his two daughters and one son. “They’re worried for me, but more than that, they’re proud of me for being brave in this scary time,” said Ali, stating this as the reason for his motivation to continue working.
Faith and safety
On a Tuesday morning in a small general store in Navi Mumbai, 29-year-old Raman is arranging freshly-arrived bread packets on the front rack, his face covered with a mask. He places a marigold flower on the counter in front of a small picture frame of Lord Hanuman.
On being asked whether he fears to risk his health working in the shop during the pandemic, he answered with a question, “Didi, darr kaise nahi hoga? (How will there not be fear?). But we are following all the rules, we wear masks and gloves, clean the shop twice a day and close it before the 5 pm deadline everyday.”
“We are doing what we can, the rest is in his hands,” he adds, pointing at the picture frame. Raman is one of the two boys who work in the store, both of them came to Mumbai from Madhya Pradesh 8 years ago.
People like Raman, Ali, and Singh are some of the many unsung warriors of the coronavirus who are running the show during the nationwide lockdown, risking their lives every day to make the carriage of daily essential tasks possible.