In Pursuit Of Prestige And Pleasure

SHRUGGING off the ubiquitous gamcha (duster) and shedding the undying loyalty that weighed him down for years, the domestic help in urban India seems to have joined his upper-middle class employer on the fast track to affluence. Now he serves to help himself. Switching jobs for financial advancement. Negotiating perks. Bettering lifestyle. And why not? An indispensable part of the service industry in the age of economic liberalisation, the domestic servant no longer wants to be the archetypal Ramu kaka.

"Why should sahib be surprised if I ask him for a loan to buy a second-hand car? His boss needs him as much as he needs me. And his office gives him an Opel, doesn't it?" says 35-year-old Jung Bahadur who works with his wife in a Greater Kailash home in upmarket south Delhi. Bahadur and his wife, who between them earn Rs 4,300 besides getting free accommodation, are unhappy with their employer's decision against funding a vehicle. They are on the lookout for a better job, and complain: "Our children see sahib's daughter sitting in the car and they throw tantrums. They don't want the cycle anymore. Servants may also want to take their children to visit relatives in a car." So, advised by friends, the Bahadurs have decided to negotiate for a car loan in their next job. "We'll probably advertise in the newspaper. We work so hard, we'll surely manage a vehicle," says Bahadur.

With more accommodating employers, Jagat Singh Pundeer has already managed a scooter, television, investment in Indira Vikas Patra and a house in suburban Noida. Chauffeur-cum-manservant for the Bhargava household in the capital, the 51-year-old impeccably dressed Pundeer seems to have groomed himself for membership in Jeeves' Junior Ganymade, the exclusive club for the gentlemen's gentlemen. His well-kept hair, polished shoes and dignified demeanour speak of a quiet confidence that was never the domestic help's prerogative till a few years ago.

"Working in someone's house is also working. We are all servants. So no point in our behaving like slaves while others appear to be officers. All work is important," says Pundeer with a flick of his Titan watch-sporting wrist. A believer in making the best of one's opportunities, he had taken a loan to invest in booking a Cielo which he later sold at a much higher price. Setting the new agenda for the working classes, he pronounces: "Today, things have changed. Banks and investments are not for sahibs alone."

Nor is education. Shantabai Rao, 37, shuttles between four houses in Mumbai's suburban Andheri to earn around Rs 3,500 and spends a good Rs 300 of it on her children's English tuitions. "My son hates studying but my daughter, Neha, works hard at school. She wants to become a teacher. My destiny of cooking and washing in other people's homes will not follow her," Shantabai hopes.

 Another who hopes for a better tomorrow for her progeny is 27-year-old Geeta Massey who darns her children's school uniform with great care in her one-room tenement in an encroachment colony on the outskirts of Delhi. Her eight-hour-long working day spread over five homes is gruelling, she says. "But it's worth it. Because I choose not to send my children to a government school. And public school, English medium education costs so much," the mother avers. Then, proudly patting her two sons, who are watching a movie on the recently purchased black-and-white television set, she says that they have just come back from private tuitions which cost her Rs 175.

 "Maids like Geeta are really profiles in hope. They are embodiments of the changing aspirations and lifestyle of the domestic help in our metros," observes Swagata Das, a middle-aged house-wife. She recalls earlier times when the preoccupation of most maids she hired were drunk husbands, irritating in-laws or demands for old clothes. "Today, most of those I hire ask for assistance in gas connections, school admissions and clerical jobs for their children," she says. And adds thoughtfully: "Unlike earlier times, very few maid servants bring their daughters along for help."

In this age of opportunities and enterprise, being a servant is no longer perceived as a 'family' vocation to be passed on from parent to child. "I know I can't dream of making my children doctors or engineers. But I can hope that they will become clerks in government offices or banks," says 24-year-old Savithri who works in three houses in Bangalore's Indiranagar. A servant from the age of 15 when she started assisting her mother, Savithri is determined that her children will have more choice in their lives.

And this choice is what 40-year-old Munni has made available to her teenage daughter Shahnaz. Munni had never made the young girl help her with her chores at the household where she works, and her ambitions were realised when her employers paid for her daughter's course in beauty therapy. A beautician now, Shahnaz's manicured hands, expensive clothes and new attitude are a far cry from her maidservant mother's humble bearing.

And because of this incongruity, observes their employer Adarsh Batra, the mother and daughter sometimes suffer from a crisis of identity. "Munni often compares expenses I incurred at my daughters' weddings with the budget she should plan for Shahnaz's. Also, she doesn't know whether boys in their community are good enough for her daughter anymore," she says. As for Shahnaz, she confesses her discomfiture in revealing her mother's professional identity to her colleagues at the beauty parlour she works for. "I want to invite them over at home sometimes, but I feel embarrassed," the young girl admits shyly.

ACCORDINGto Professor Abdul Aziz, social scientist at the Bangalore-based Institute for Social and Economic Change, such unfortunate fallouts of newfound consumerism are natural in a society that, till recently, had designated a certain place for its 'servant-class'. "In fact, the micro and macro changes currently going on in Indian society are bound to unsettle everyone. For starters, the tremors are being felt in urban India—both by the master and the domestic help," the academic says. Explaining the phenomenon, Aziz says that accessibility to media and to upper-middle class homes that are prospering in liberalised India contributes majorly to these new desires. Emulating their employers, the domestic servant decides that a television, scooter, car, gas connection, air coolers are no longer luxury items. "Add to that the availability of hire-purchase schemes and loans and you begin to comprehend why most domestic help in urban India have television sets," he says.

Take Kamla ki ma for instance. Having cleaned toilets at the modest homes of Grade II Government officials in Delhi's Sarojini Nagar all her life, she now has her daughters-in-law and grand-daughters doing the same. Bare till a year ago, her modest home in adjoining Vinay Nagar now has a television, a gas connection and a fridge. "Us jam adars (cleaners) could never have dreamt of owning these things earlier...why, even our maliks (employers) didn't possess them. But now the daughters-in-law work in homes that have these goods so they too save up to buy them," the old woman clucks.

Yes, times have changed. So have lifestyles. And desires. Nostalgically chronicling this transformation, octogenarian Bhiku Phoola More, who has been cooking and living in Bombay's Zaveri household for the past 60 years, observes: "I wasn't educated. But my children went to high school. Their children, who already have access to things like a television and tape recorders, will study even further. But, I must add, the six rupees salary I earned 60 years ago had more value than the Rs 1,000 I might earn today."

 However, while inflation has risen, so have the aspirations. At 27, K. Prakash, driver to a Ban-galore cardiologist, has applied for a bank loan to buy a three-wheeler. With the rising rents and costs of essential commodities shooting up, Prakash feels that extra enterprise is imperative to improve lifestyle. "After all I need the extra money to take care of a family when I decide to get married. As a car driver I don't earn extra money for the extra hours that I put in but not so if I drive a three-wheeler," he says. 

Yes, strategies for career advancements are being cooked quietly in kitchens. Formalisation of a service sector that was taken for granted is happening in urban homes. And with the working-couple becoming a common phenomenon, demand for skilled and reliable help at home is far outstripping the supply. And the domestic help is cashing in on it. As he should. "I give my servants a raise every year. And 10 per cent of their yearly salary is chalked out for their Diwali gifts. Call it bonus if you please. Plus a day off every fortnight.

Managing help at home is becoming like an extension of human resource management in office," chuckles Mahesh Babu of Mumbai's Ninad Music. Cast-off clothes and leftovers are out, he says. "This Diwali I bought my servant a Walkman. My mother-in-law was surprised. My friends weren't. They understood it was all part of boosting employee morale!" Yes, morale is high. Desires are skyrocketing. And the servant has decided to be master of his own destiny.