Sharing the experiences of Astitva in Dehradun in facilitating placement and its efforts to form `friendly employer groups`, Preeti Kirbat touches upon the challenges faced in the formation of these groups, how these challenges were overcome, and how working with these groups helps to ensure decent treatment of domestic workers.

Astitva is a community based, working women`s organisation in Dehradun that strives to empower and enable women workers from poor socio-economic areas to access better-paid work and, thereby, have increased control over their lives. Low incomes and poor economic control result in reduced decision-making powers for women regarding health, education and money management. It also makes women and children more vulnerable to abuse and violence.

Dehradun has suddenly expanded in the last decade from a small sleepy town into a bustling city. The city has a population of about 12 lakhs and is attracting an increasing number of migrants from surrounding areas and from other states such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and Neighbouring Nepal. The majority of these migrant workers come to live in the city`s slums and join the construction and domestic workforce. Typically, domestic workers work seven days a week without any scheduled days off, and are paid very low wages for hard manual work.

Astitva works mainly with domestic workers and their children in southwest Dehradun in two villages and three urban slum clusters. The majority of women in the Astitva community are migrants; they work as domestic workers whereas their husbands work as construction workers. In Dehradun, the average monthly wage for full-time domestic work is around Rs 2,000 and around Rs 350 per task per month.

Astitva understands that class and gender issues are central to determining the situation of domestic workers. However, these workers are survivors and not victims; they ensure that family needs are met through hard work, and are, thus, central to our philosophy of creating a symbiotic relationship among women from varied socio-economic backgrounds. Astitva has a holistic approach; it believes in protecting and promoting women`s rights because workers by themselves cannot bring about the overall and sustained empowerment of women.

Women bear the main burden of household responsibilities, including cleaning, cooking and child care. Most of them face restrictions, harassment and regular violence at home and have lack of support from their husbands and parents. Therefore, Astitva aims to empower women so that they are able to lead their lives with dignity, both at home and the work place. Women are encouraged to challenge restrictive and oppressive attitudes and practices present in the wider context of class, gender and social structure.

Concretely, Astitva works a) to ensure that women receive proper wages under reasonable work conditions, b) to increase their economic opportunities by entering competitive work areas and drawing higher salaries, c) to facilitate their access to support services such as crèches, clinics and legal aid, d) to inculcate professional work attitudes among all women workers, e) to provide women and young girls with information about their social and economic rights thereby ensuring gender equality in homes and communities, f) to provide women with information about how to use their money and resources in an effective manner, and g) to be a space for women and girls to come and build friendships, discuss difficulties and aspirations, and enjoy and relax. Astitva has undertaken this work through awareness building and rights advocacy, organising women workers in the community, leadership building, job placement, and establishing an employers` support group.

Astitva has had great success in organising job placements and the formation of a friendly employers` group. Domestic workers come to Astitva every day, seeking help in finding jobs. They describe the sort of job they would like, the suitable timings, their experience, salary expectations, etc. A few of them are keen to try other work such as working as helpers in schools, tailoring or cooking. Astitva tries to help them find work for them accordingly. Similarly, employers contact Astitva to recruit domestic workers. Astitva tallies the requirements of both employers and the domestic workers and fixes appointments for meetings at the office. During the meeting, employers are informed about Astitva`s role in promoting basic wages and the rights of domestic workers and, at the same time, in helping build a supportive and sensitive relationship between employer and employee. The employer is asked to sign an employer`s form that states that Astitva works to increase the earnings of low-income women and that as employers they agree to pay their domestic workers as agreed at Astitva, treat them with respect and dignity, give them one day in a week off, etc. Employers are told that a minimum of Rs 2,500 per month be paid for full-time workers (8 hours) and Rs 400 be paid per task such as sweeping-mopping and dish washing. If the number of family members or rooms in the house is more, higher wages are fixed. Astitva also suggests payment of Rs 25 per hour for overtime work. Astitva charges the employers a placement fee of Rs 100.

Initially, however, things were not so smooth. Employers would approach Astitva as a service provider only, demanding that new domestic workers be sent as and when they wanted, and at the timings and rates they decided. Some also treated the staff and domestic workers, who went to meet them for domestic worker placement, in a demeaning way. Thus, the meetings were shifted to the Astitva office, thereby establishing a more equal ground for discussions and negotiations. There has also been collective resistance from employers, who thought that some of the domestic workers were `becoming difficult` and that Astitva was `spoiling` them. These resulted in Astitva reassessing its approach and clarifying to both employers and domestic workers that it is an organisation that supports domestic workers and other low-income women workers from the unorganised sector, and not simply a placement service.

Despite attempts to create an open communicative and supportive relationship, both the workers and employers often came back with complaints. The domestic workers are unhappy because employers are not paying enough, are making them do more work than was agreed upon, are not speaking nicely to them, are not offering them tea, etc. The employers are usually unhappy because the domestic workers are not regular, come late and do not inform their employers in advance about taking leave. As a norm, Astitva encourages domestic workers to have a professional approach by being punctual, asking about what work needs to be done, their wages, the days off, etc., charging for extra work done or overtime, and feeling good about their work. When they have complaints, they are encouraged to tell their employers directly the cause for their unhappiness rather than simply stop going to work. In case they are unable to communicate to the employers for some reason, the staff of Astitva speaks to the employer.

Astitva, in mid-2009, began an effort to set up a formal employers` group to reach out to employers of domestic workers. Many employers do not consider that the domestic workers have rights. They are not aware they have a responsibility of paying reasonable wages and treating their domestic workers with dignity. However, over the last year (2009), some of these employer women from the surrounding localities have become supporters of Astitva`s work.

In recent months, members of the employers` support group have helped Astitva deal with cases of angry employers and worker-employer conflicts. One or two members of the employers` support group usually go to the concerned employer`s house to discuss the problem and to explain to them the situation of the domestic worker and why Astitva is supporting the worker. Many employers assume that all high-income employers should and will support each other and all domestic workers will support each other. In one example, an employer was paying a young woman with a small child Rs 500 for full-time work. The domestic worker`s husband had deserted her. Because her employer helped her by giving her meals and old clothes, the domestic worker initially felt very grateful for the support; later, she realised that she could not manage with the money she earned from the full-time work. Astitva counselled the domestic worker and found two part-time jobs for her to do along with the present work. However, when the domestic worker communicated her wish to either be paid for full-time work or be able to work in more houses, the employer refused. The employer got very angry and came to Astitva and shouted at the staff. Some members of the employers` support group members went with the domestic worker to the employer`s house that same afternoon and explained to the employer that she either should employ the worker for specific tasks or employ her full time and pay her accordingly. The employer decided to employ the domestic worker on a part-time basis.

Thus, the understanding that domestic workers are `workers` with `rights of workers` and that minimum wages, fixed timings and tasks, days off, etc., are the basic rights of domestic workers is coming about. Astitva helps create an awareness that the issue is a larger one of workers and employers as a community rather than that of one employer and one domestic worker in conflict.

ILO Convention for Domestic Workers

The proposed ILO Convention is a very important step towards recognising the rights of Domestic Workers around the world. It will set the basic guidelines for classifying and defining domestic work, making domestic work contractual and deciding remuneration.

However, a strong national legislation is needed to encompass other issues such as paid leave, contracts and social security so that there is a standard legislation at the national level, which benefits domestic workers.