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ABSTRACT
This essay examines the instance and the aftermath of a violent confrontation between domestic workers and middle-class apartment residents in the Noida-Delhi region with a view to understand the evolving employer-employee dynamics vis-à-vis paid domestic work in India. Through interviews with workers and employers, and careful study of citizens’ reports, FIRs, and media reports, the essay investigates how the conflict between a domestic worker and her employer snowballed into a ‘riot’ between basti-dwellers and apartment residents. The paper analyses the confrontation within the processes of urbanization and class-formation in the post-liberalization era. Employers deployed religious and regional identity markers as well modern technologies of surveillance to exploit the vulnerabilities of the workers. The tension between the employer’s desire for total control and the compulsions of a very specific kind of labour shortage, along with the weight of ‘political economy’ determined the nature, limit and reach of the ‘economy of power’. The dimension of gender complicated the relationship between the ‘madams’ and the ‘maids’ and affected the processes of group solidarities within and across classes.
Acknowledgments
A version of the essay was presented at the Second International Conference on ‘Servants’ Pasts’, held on 11–13 April 2018 in Berlin, Germany. I am grateful to the organisers and participants for their comments which contributed immensely in revising the essay. I am also thankful to Arushi, Ritu and Sunil for helping in transcribing the interviews. I would also like to thank Aditya Sarkar, Chitra Joshi, Prabhu Mohapatra, Sumit Sarkar, Tanika Sarkar, Satish Deshpande, Camille, Mayur and Naveen for their extensive comments and suggestions. Last but not the least, I am grateful to the workers for sharing their thoughts and information with me.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. I am conscious of the problematic nature of the term ‘riot’, as many scholars such as E. P. Thompson have pointed out. Here it has been used merely as a descriptive category rather than an analytical one. It should be understood as within quotation marks, whenever it occurs in the essay. The quotation marks have been removed for the sake of smooth reading of the essay.
2. The fieldwork for this research was initiated in September 2017. A number of workers living in various slums in Noida Sector 78 and Sector 76, and directly affected by the riot were interviewed. Interviews were also conducted with the residents of Mahagun Moderne – the housing society where the riot took place – and with those living in the nearby apartments. Focus Group Discussions (FGD) and interviews were conducted with workers of various categories such as domestic workers, security guards, cleaning workers, and vegetable vendors who either work in these apartments or derive their livelihood indirectly from them. Workers still fighting the riot related cases and their lawyers were interviewed.
3. All interviews and FGDs, with a total of 56 persons, for this research were conducted between September 2017 to February 2018, in Noida Sector 76 and Sector 78, in and around Amrapali basti, Antariksh basti, Mahagun Moderne apartment, and Hyde Park apartment. Duration of the interviews was between 15 minutes to 1.5 hours and FGDs were on average 1 hour. Of the total of 56 persons interviewed, 6 were employers, and 38 were domestic workers, with others (guards, construction workers, undertrials, NGO persons, etc.) counting to 12.
4. This is a general account of the incident drawn from various newspaper reports and interviews with workers and residents of Mahagun Moderne. As it is with any riot, there are significant variations and points of stress in the accounts provided by different sections of people involved.
5. See various reports: ‘Why a posh society in Noida saw domestic workers revolt’ https://www.dailyo.in/variety/domestic-workers-india-noida-mob-violence-abuse-class-divide/story/1/18326.html, Accessed 10 January 2018. ‘The case of a missing maid has ignited a class war in a luxury housing complex in India’ https://qz.com/1028381/noida-mahagun-moderne-the-case-of-a-missing-maid-has-ignited-a-class-war-in-a-louxury-housing-complex-in-india, Accessed 10 January 2018. ‘In Noida, a riot-like situation over a domestic worker puts the focus on India’s bitter class chasm’ https://scroll.in/article/843601/in-noida-a-riot-like-situation-over-a-domestic-worker-puts-the-focus-on-indias-stark-class-chasmall. Accessed 15 January 2018.
6. NDTV did a story on how the Mahagun incident was projected in various media as an attack by Bangladeshi migrants. See https://khabar.ndtv.com/video/show/mojo/mojo-bangladeshi-vs-hindustani-463254. Accessed 12 December 2017.
7. ‘Noida society violence: Mahesh Sharma sides with family as authorities raze shanties’ http://indianexpress.com/article/india/noida-society-violence-mahesh-sharma-sides-with-family-as-authorities-raze-shanties/. Accessed 10 January 2018.
8. For different accounts of the incident, see FIR 602, 603, 605, and 606, all dated 12 July 2017, Police Station Sector 49, Noida. Also see, Final Report/Closure Report in FIR 602, dated 22 July 2017.
9. Cowan, ‘Fragmented Citizenships in Gurgaon.’
10. Srivastava, Entangled Urbanism, 118.
11. http://www.mahagunindia.com/projects/completed-projects/mahagun-moderne/, last accessed 10 January 2018.
12. Rich, ‘The Gated Community Mentality.’
13. Hosagrahar, ‘Negotiated Modernity.’
14. Srivastava, Entangled Urbanism, 159.
15. Names of all the informants – employers, workers, neighbours – have been changed to ensure their safety.
16. Chatterjee, ‘Democracy and Economic Transformation.’
17. This is based on FGDs conducted with women domestic workers from both the bastis.
18. Chatterjee, Politics of the Governed, 27–52.
19. Breman, Footloose Labour, 238–239.
20. Grover, Chambers and Jefferey, ‘Portraits of Women’s Paid Domestic Care Labour.’
21. Note that even if Zohra was guilty of having stolen money, it would not have been difficult for her to either hide the money somewhere or simply dispose it off and leave the apartment. The fact that she hid herself instead and did not wish to face the residents was a measure also of her (probably valid) apprehension that she would have to face the reprisal irrespective of whether she was (or was not) proven guilty.
22. Lan, Global Cinderellas,15–16.
23. The preference for Hindu cooks was corroborated by all the domestic workers interviewed.
24. Banerjee et al, ‘Caste and Religion.’
25. Srivastava, Entangled Urbanism, Chapter Two, 31–56.
26. On such old networks of domestic service see Ray and Qayum, Cultures of Servitude, 65–91.
27. see for instance, Fuchs, ‘Political Economy and Surveillance Theory.’
28. This topic is discussed in Menon, Seeing Like a Feminist, Chapter One.
29. Ambika and Gauri confessed in their interviews that the harsh decision of not employing Muslim Bengali workers was quietly abandoned by many within weeks.
30. Ray and Qayum, Cultures of Servitude, 107.
31. Dicky, ‘Permeable Homes: Domestic Service.’
32. John, Toppo and Cochhary, Noida’s Domestic Workers’ Take on the ‘Madams’.
33. Anderson, Doing the Dirty Work? Chapter Nine, 159–174.
34. Cox, The Servant Problem, 112.
35. In their interviews, the domestic workers repeatedly talked about the hardships that their ‘poor madams’ faced in the immediate aftermath of the riot. In a FGD with them, they said – ‘for all 5 days, when we were banned in the society, our poor madams used paper plates and paper glasses!.’