Saher Husain Week 7.

“Of Rasoi ka Kaam/Bathroom ka Kaam Perspectives of Women Domestic Workers” by Sonal Sharma talks about the aspect of purity and pollution in between the relationship of the employer and the employee and the barrier of caste and class thus created. This intersectionality that occurs due to gender, caste and class barrier causes segregation of certain people into ‘dirt’ or ‘pollution’, who are supposed to be the ones who don’t belong or are outsiders. The author, through the perspective of the employees working at the homes of the employers in Delhi, tries to show how caste structure of untouchability or the notion of the pure and pollution works inside this space as well.  

We realise how it is only a particular group of individuals that are recruited or given work at home where the barrier of caste or religion comes into the picture. The barrier is created not only through such recruitment but also through the perspective of the workers themselves, where workers belonging to a particular group of caste do not want to associate themselves with the work done by the workers of lower caste because the work is not theirs to do. The author shows how even access to resources is based on the type of work that is done by the employee and how one is recognised or identified by the way one dresses, walks and speaks. The author also speaks about how even workers deem working inside certain group of individuals’ homes as clean or unclean, for example a Hindu worker might not work inside the house of a Muslim because of their notion of clean and hygienic might differ. We see how workers themselves create certain form of stereotypes when deciding where to work and where not to through their notion of dirty or clean house.

Thus, we understand how stereotypes are not only created by the employers for the employees but also by the employees themselves. Though the magnitude of segregation or demarcation differs, the notion or perception of clean, hygienic or dirty, polluted remains the same among all. This social hierarchy created among the workers themselves show the want of one group to be considered cleaner or less polluted than the other which leads to assertion of power and status of one class of individuals from the other.

Submitted By- Saher Husain (18010673)