The sweeper in our society did not turn up for two days. Garbage piled up. There had been complaints about his shoddy work and he was pulled up. I thought, he had resigned and no replacement could be found. So anxiety ensued.
However, he turned up yesterday at 4 p.m. He was grinning from ear to ear. He was just back from a trip in a hired car to Ganapati Pule in Konkan. His family and his wife's family had gone there together to take advantage of the long weekend. He was very pleased. The temple at Ganapati Pule is very nice and it is located right on the sea shore.
The sweeper is a pious man. However, the temple did not appeal so much to him as did the shore. He saw an ocean for the first time and was very impressed.
A few years ago, when he joined, he wore torn clothes, did not have footwear and was afraid of society rules. He did other cleaning jobs at offices in the 'Mega center', a nearby office complex. He ran around cycling from the society to these offices. He settled down as he is a sincere worker. However, during the lockdown, all the offices were closed and our society work was his only means of sustenance.
Now the offices are open and in full swing. It is difficult to get cleaners who make decent money as compared to the past. Their stamina and time are the only constraints. So the sweeper looked around and decided to have a family vacation. Progress indeed.
Our gardener has 2 daughters and 2 sons. The daughters are clever, sons less so. However, due to reservation policy, all of them have jobs and are doing well.
One of the maids in the society has 4 daughters and 2 sons. The daughters are educated and have jobs in Amazon! One son is a driver for Amazon. All are doing well. So much so that they have rented a 2-bedroom flat in our building in addition to their flat in a multistorey slum rehabilitation building nearby. The daughters wear capris, trousers and T-shirts and ride 2-wheelers.
So with progressive government policies, with the spread of digital technology and with demonstration effect of television and social media, the bottom is coming up.
This is progress and not Ambani's/ Adani's joining the club of the world's richest persons.
2 comments:
I just was cleaning out emails, and came across this, which was unread.
It is interesting, the maids, gardners and your sweeper have brought themselves up in the world, and their children are educated and have good jobs. Now one lives in your complex.
would this have happened without the caste system being broken down?
Have you read Isobel Wilkerson's book Caste? It is actually very difficult to read, with the inhumanity to others that is described, so I never actually read much of it.
Leslie Hogya
Thank you for your comment.
You are right but partially. The government's affirmative action programme has certainly helped the so-called lower castes and they are coming up. The objective of the programme is to address the problem of caste and so it is confined to Hindus among Indians. It is a tribute to the flexibility and forward-looking nature of Hinduism that affirmative action is succeeding without much violence. However, the very success of this programme has prompted Muslims and Christians in India also to demand it. They too, have the blight of caste. So caste is not a Hindu but an Indian phenomenon.
Government policy is attacking casteism on the one hand but in politics, in calculations for winning elections, caste is a predominant consideration. Therefore caste is getting stronger in India despite the affirmative action.
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