Last month we celebrated our 72nd Indian Independence Day. The celebrations began with various businesses offering discounts and the usual display of government parades. While people from different walks of life commemorated the day in their ways, the Pakistani government set free 30 Indian prisoners, this Independence Day. According to Geo News, the Foreign Office spokesperson Dr Mohammed Faisal said that the decision was taken on humanitarian grounds.
While we celebrate our freedom, thousands still live in bondage- experiencing oppression and torture in captivity. Even as we hoisted the flags and congratulated ourselves that we are free now, children were born into bondage and are coerced into working instead of getting an education. Their life is not theirs to live. This Independence Day was like any other day for them.
Amidst our busy schedules, the weekends are precious to us as it serves as a breather when we can pause, relax with our families and refresh before resuming work the next week. But some people toil non-stop whether it is Independence Day, Republic Day, Diwali or Pongal- the holidays make no difference to them. They are also denied adequate food, clean water, rest, and their right to freedom. I am referring to bonded labourers who live like strangers in their own country, unable to “celebrate” anything as their lives are in shambles due to bonded labour which is very much prevalent and rampant in our nation now, more than it ever was.
Sathish* was one of the many who fell for the facade of a good job, decent pay, and security. He worked in a brick kiln for almost five years trying to repay an advance amount of Rs 5,000 which he borrowed from a brick kiln owner for his sister’s wedding. He worked along with his wife and two small children who were forced to carry and lay bricks, while the owner’s children went to school, were clothed and fed well. In exchange, the entire family was given a maximum of Rs 200 per week. The owner levied heavy interest on the amount Sathish borrowed and eventually the repayable amount swelled from Rs 5,000 to Rs 20,000. As expected, the poor family could not pay such a hefty amount and faced threats and physical abuse by the owner, at the worksite.
The work extracted from the labourers exceeded the advance amount of the few thousands that the owner holds against them as debt. But the owner uses their ignorance to his advantage and keeps them thinking that they are obliged to him and that they still owe him. The result? Labourers remain in bondage for years with meagre or no wages. Sadly, this kind of exploitation to obtain manual labour for a cheap price has become the norm, and many illiterate labourers continue to be deceived thus.
In some cases, only Rs 100/- is given as wages for the whole family at the end of the week.
For some of us, a hundred rupees is less than what we spend in a day. We may spend it on one meal or just one piece of dessert for an occasional indulgence. But for bonded labourers that one hundred rupees that they receive on the weekend, is the lifeline that barely sustains them. The wages are not enough for one decent square meal a day. So, all thoughts of education, buying of clothes and other necessities for clean living is neglected. The outcome of this is a growing population of impoverished people who are vulnerable to generational bondage as they are forced to choose between a meal and an education. Ultimately, food takes precedence over any other need, leaving the labourers to barely exist.
The sight of the labourers and their children are hence piteous.
Instead of attending classes in school they are rudely awakened at unearthly hours to work like cattle till the sunset. Wearing oversized, hand-me-down clothes that hang on their skeletal frames just like their skin does from their malnourished bodies, hair that is a coarse mass of sundried tangles due to poor nourishment and slogging in the heat all day, sunken eyes that lack life. This is the picture painted by the monstrous crime that is bonded labour.
Walls, guards or the law do not confine bonded labourers. They have not committed a crime to find themselves in situations of bondage. They are undeserving of the prison sentence meted out to them. They are prisoners of circumstances, prisoners of the greed and inhumanity of the better off classes vying to become richer, feeding off the blood and sweat of the weaker sections. They do not even know what time of day, date or year it is sometimes and goes through life not knowing how many years of their lives have passed when they are rescued. Due to lack of education, these labourers are unaware of their rights and privileges that come with government entitlements, hence trapping themselves in diabolical schemes of bondage.
The term “bonded labour” might stir up images from movies like “Paradesi” and “12 Years a Slave” which shows ancient times when bonded labour and human trafficking was widely practised. Decades later, though there are laws now to curb the practice and to protect the vulnerable, the crime continues to threaten the poorer sections which are the prime targets of this social evil.
Bonded Labour still exists.
*Names changed.