“It’s a struggle,” said Indravati Gautam, trying hard to hold her sobs back. “My daughter is due to deliver a baby, and there’s hardly any food at home.”
Two months ago, Ms. Gautam (37) and her two daughters arrived in Mumbai from her village near Lucknow, to spend some time with her husband and son, who live in a chawl in Paunpada, Kalwa. Her husband did small jobs for a living, among them, selling fish. Often, he’d keep aside some for the family’s dinner. Now, with the city in lockdown to contain the spread of COVID-19, food is hard to come by.
The Gautam family’s story is one of very many.
The army of street vendors, mechanics and electricians operating from hole-in-the-wall shops, and other odd-jobbers, who make enough money to survive and perhaps send some to families far away, have been stuck indoors with no income and no clue about how they will survive.
Caged in
Another such case is Ritesh Yadav (21), from a village near Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh. He fixes air-conditioners near where he lives, in Tulsipada, Bhandup. With summer well in, this would have been a peak season for him, with up to 20 calls a day. Now, he is able to do two, earning ₹400 a day.
“All other jobs such as refilling the gas or changing the capacitor need to be done in workshops, which have been shut,” he said. Even the few jobs he can do is by being very careful. He said he is sure he won’t get police permission to go out and work: “Mine is not an essential service, and if I go to the police, they will put me behind bars.” He is surviving on handouts from relatives in the city and the kindness of the boys he shares his room with. “The moment this lockdown lifts,” he said, “I’m going right back to my village.”
Santosh Giri (33), who commuted every day from Titwala to Kalina, where he sold coconuts from a roadside stall, is also despairing. With the coconut-selling and odd jobs for residents of nearby buildings, he would earn up to ₹300 a day, barely enough to feed his wife and two young children — a daughter aged seven and a son who is 10. “Everyone is suffering like I am,” he said, with resignation. “I guess we will just have to live through this.”
Before the lockdown, Mohammed Bin Rain (45), lived an uncertain life. He would make ₹8,000 some months, ₹10,000 in better months, enough to take care of his wife and three young children, who share a 10 ftx15 ft room in Shastri Nagar, Bhayander, with him.
He pays ₹5,000 as rent and electricity, and after food expenses, sends ₹2,000 to ₹3,000 to his parents in his village in Uttar Pradesh. He has never felt more alone, he said. “No one comes by to ask if we’re alive, or whether we have enough to eat. I’ve been sitting at home without work for over two months now.”
It’s not just the loss of income; he’s running up debt: “My landlord lent me ₹25,000, and I have no idea how I’ll repay him.” Like all his neighbours, Mr. Rain feels trapped. “I have no savings, and I can’t even go back to my village. All I do is eat and sleep.”
Ramesh Kanu’s case is unique. The 45-year-old carpenter finds himself stuck in Pune, where he had gone to work on an apartment. The owner of the flat is providing him and five other workmen with groceries, and the men are cooking for themselves in the flat and staying there.
Through a friend in Pune, he tried to sneak out of the city in a fruit truck, but the driver backed out at the last minute, leaving him stranded. “I feel like a caged bird,” he said. He speaks with his wife and children in Jogeshwari, Mumbai, on the phone, but the separation is hard. “The first thing I will do when this lockdown is lifted, is return to Mumbai,” he said. “I am used to heavy work; the sedentary life is telling on my health. Every time I come down with something, I’m afraid it could be coronavirus.”
A lifeline?
The Ministry of Home Affairs issued a notification on April 15 allowing self-employed people like mechanics, electricians, and carpenters, among other professions, to operate after April 20.
But with the national lockdown in force till May 3, this does not offer much hope. Those whom The Hindu reached out to had no idea of such a notification.
Mr. Rain said he’s not sure he will get enough work during the lockdown, even if he is allowed to carry on. “ Aage khuda hai (There’s a god who will somehow provide),” he said.
“How are we supposed to travel to work when there will be no buses or trains?” asked Felix Lobo (50), an electrician who travels to work in Kalina from his home in Vikhroli.
Until the lockdown is lifted, Mr. Lobo and others like him have little choice. “Things are getting tough,” he said. “I was earning up to ₹600 a day, but have no savings. There’s no one to help.”
