With my maid...

Public health and education are the most important aspects of any civilized society. The development of a country can never take place if its citizens are unhealthy or uneducated.

Here I present the profile of my maid. Her answers made me rethink if we really are on that coveted path of ‘development’, about which we proudly boast.
40-year-old Rani residing in Trilokpuri is already a grandmother. She was married off at the tender age of 12. Reminiscing her childhood, she regrets, “Bas maine hi nahi pada! Meri badi behen ki shadi hui toh sasural walon ne mera bhi gauna kara di…”
Today, 27 years hence, Rani is living the life of a domestic help.
She suffers mostly from pain in legs. For treatment, she sometimes goes to dispensary or gets medicines from the people she works for. Generally, she ignores her ill health until it becomes unbearable. As she says, “ yeh toh hota hi rehta hai.”

She had four children, one out of which died. Initially, she says, “Do bachche hain.” But after a while adds, “ Haan, ek beti bhi hai par ab toh uski shadi ho gayi.” So, in all she has an elder daughter, a son, another daughter (who died at the age of 12 from Tuberculosis) and a younger son. All her children have studied upto class 5th in a school, the name of which she does not know, “ No.7 Trilokpuri mein ek school hai wahi padte hain sab”. Her children also used to get meals at the school but she took them off school after 5th because, “ School mein bachche bimar pad jate the.” When I asked about her annual expenditure on education she said, “ Wo toh inke pitaji ko pata hai.”

Talking about children, she said that her elder son usually suffers from nausea and fever whereas the younger son was more prone to bodyaches. For their illness, “No.8 Trilokpuri se dawai lete hain.” She says she always goes to a private clinic, never a government one. “Ek baar sarkari aspataal walon ne bahot tez dawai de di thi… uske baad se toh ab nahi dikhati bachon ko wahan.” Also, since the treatment is free, she is skeptical about the type of medicines they give.


Here I could not help thinking that some of her statements clearly showed her nonchalant attitude towards her own health, her preference for a boy and the fact that even though she earned, she did not know much about the expenditure.