“When we
three friends met on the last occasion, a very disturbing realization hit us,”
I said to Lulu, my parrot.
When they
get curious, parrots will move from one branch to another making chirpy sound
before perching on your window. Lulu spoke to me from his high seat on my
window, “What was that? Tell me.”
If you have
played tennis and talked to the chair umpire, who is placed four feet higher
above players’ head; you will appreciate this – the position matters. It is
imposing. John McEnroe’s tantrums may have hurt the umpire, but the umpire’s
word stands. He is the boss! His judgment is final. I wonder if parrots know
this instinctively, but they never come to a man’s level.
“We three
realized that we have never travelled by Mumbai’s local trains in the last
fifteen years! Oh, how times have changed, will you believe that we travelled
by local trains for full twenty five years before buying car?” I explained. “We
realized that we have moved far away from the realities of everyday life of
that section of the society of which we were once a part. I mean… it is as if
that section of society is now a part of museum for you.”
“Hmm…. So?”
“Such
feelings impact your thinking. I was to hold a training program. It began on a
different note as I opened up the subject.”
“Subject?”
“Contract
labour.”
“Oh! What
did you do?”
“I decided
to check the realities. No, that is not the correct statement. I decided to sensitize
them to the realities they may have ignored. So I appealed to them to think as
if they are contract labourers and answer my questions.”
“Interesting…”
“What
followed shocked me. I asked them why did they ‘become’ contract labour. ‘We
are not educated, we do not have skills.’ One person said ‘Even if you have
skills, nobody wants to offer a permanent job – so you have no choice.’”
“So they
got in the shoes of contract labour….”
“Most of
them have only helmet, no shoes! Ha ha!! And most of the injuries are on feet
not so much on head. But let us continue with our story. ‘What do you think of
the permanent workers union?’ was my next question to these managers. ‘Self-centered!
They only think for themselves. They get fat pay rise, they are happy as long
as we are paid minimum wages.’ ‘Many of them do not work – they get their work
done by us. We have no choice, if they complain we will lose our job. We do
their work – but they take their fat pay.’”
“I never thought
they knew all this….” Lulu said as he nibbled at the chilly.
“Now the
next question – ‘What do you think of the Company’s management?’ And there was
uncomfortable silence. Then one said ‘We do not exist for them. They simply
want to know how many are at work. Many managers use us for getting their personal
work done, if you are in office. Managers come and go, we stay there!’”
“So they
are ‘persona non grata’ as the HR-walas put it” Lulu said. “They refuse to
recognize the person as a member of their team.”
“Yes, you
said it. I continued asking them ‘how are you treated at the entrance gate.’ ‘Oh,
the permanent workers go in first. We have to wait. We are thoroughly checked
at the gate. Sometimes women feel embarrassed.’ ‘Some factories have a different
gate for us. Otherwise we have to stand in a corner till the watchman calls us
out.”
“There are
no gates in the sky…. You should have asked them about the canteen.” Lulu
observed.
“Yes. I
asked them about it. They said ‘Very often they provide a separate canteen for
contract workers.’ ‘The facilities there are basic minimum, if at all they can
be called facilities.’ ‘This is actually very wrong because they do more hard
work than the company workers.’ ‘More glaring discrimination is on shop floor. At
many factories the permanent workers and the contract workers do the same job –
in some cases a contract worker relieves the first shift worker in the second
shift – there is obvious huge difference in pay. This is what hurts most…’”
“They put
their finger on the real problem.”
“True. I
asked their reactions to this invidious practice.”
“But don’t they
see what is happening right where they work? How can they not do anything about
it?” Lulu’s tone was sharper.
“There was
silence. Very uncomfortable silence. Nobody wanted to bell the cat. But I think
a point was made. I changed the line of questioning. I asked ‘Imagine a poor
family of four – husband, wife and two children. They require a two room
dwelling place, modest it may be. The children go to municipal school; they require
adequate clothing and footwear, money to buy books, some recreational activity.
So does the wife. They require two good meals a day as the man is employed in a
manual work which strains him. What should be his monthly income to provide all
this?’”
“And what
did they say?”
“Somebody
said ‘Ten thousand’ ‘Twelve thousand’ ‘Actually nothing less than twenty
thousand.’ So I asked ‘how much you pay them?’ ‘Minimum wages – about six and a
half thousand!’ One manager said ‘I had never really thought about this; the
only question I asked myself was whether the company was paying them minimum wages
and complying with the law.’ 'And if we pay only minimum wages, his real wages do not rise at all over years!'”
“Unions in
India are asking for ten thousand as the minimum wage. Not without
justification.”
“Then I
asked them the last question… I said I would give them a ‘half’ sentence and
they have to complete it. So I said ‘being contract worker is like…’ They
almost unanimously said ‘being a slave.’”
“So we have
a lot of onlookers, not managers. They are aware of the facts but they do not
do anything to change it. Union reps are also in the same boat. Interesting,
indeed. Only human beings have this unique ability to shut their eyes to the reality.”
Lulu said as he flew away.
Vivek
PS: This is a true story but told in this format.