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As India battles the most devastating public health crisis it has seen in a hundred years, its deep social divide becomes more glaring.The situation brings to mind how images can look dramatically different depending on which side of the telescope we are looking through. Viewed from one end, despite the pandemic, life goes on in fair comfort for the well-to-do, with no bread and butter issues, their glitz and glamour all intact. This India, with its deep pockets, shines on. But when we look through the other end of the telescope, the scene is dramatically opposite with the tragedy of the pandemic being further aggravated by sheer poverty, forcing people to sell their souls to survive. Here is a piece of verse, titled ‘Kamla’, where a working class woman explains the ordeal she goes through on losing her job.
Kamla
I am Kamla
I come from Patna
I am a household maid
I have been in Delhi for a decade.
My memsahib is a kind lady
She gives me food
Everyday, three times daily.
I live in a slum in ‘Paatal Lok’
It is a basti for our kind of folk
Sahib Log, of course, live in ‘Swarg Lok’
White marble floors
Capacious cool rooms
Just like all other regular, rich folk.
These days, Sahib Log are very tense
Nervous, as if, pinned against the fence
But by evenings
They are all set to ‘zoom’
All prim and proper, well groomed
And by nine, it is goodbye to gloom
Scotch flows
Sahib Log do cheers
Memsahibs glow and sparkle in DeBeers
They begin with ‘Helloji’
And then go on to share their fears.
Last night, one memsahib said aloud
‘Let’s ban people from ‘ Paatal Lok’
All this dirty jhuggi jhopari crowd……
I heard that
And lost my breath…..
For me, my job was a matter of life and death.
What will I do?
No roof
No food
Where will I go?
What will my children undergo?
I don’t care about the virus
For me
Feeding my children is a bigger crisis!
See, I am young
I am thirty three
A mother of three
Sole breadwinner
I am distraught
I shudder at the thought
Tell me
Would I have to turn to the oldest profession…..
Just for food…..
Tell me
For children of lesser Gods
Why is life so skewed?
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.
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