Minaj Latkar

Sharmila Joshi

Editor

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Lilabai Memane is sitting on the floor of her two-room
mud and brick house. Two of her daughters are next to her, doing their school
homework. It is one the few quiet moments in her 19-hour work day. 

From 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. six days a week, Lilabai is
at the state-run anganwadi
to cook food for 30 kids and for pregnant women in the village. By the time she
reaches the anganwadi,
she has already been up and working for seven hours. And she stops only around
10 at night.

When
Lilabai wakes up by 3 a.m., one of her first tasks is fetching water from a
well two kilometres away. “At least 20 pots of water are required, my daughters
help,” she says. Lilabai’s husband helps too. 
Between them, the family makes at least four trips to the well over four
hours.

Their
village, Phalode, in Ambegaon taluka
of Pune district, usually goes dry every year from March to June. The 464 people (Census 2011) in
the village, many of them from
the Koli Mahadev community, depend on the water from one well. When the
well runs dry, they subsist on water from private tankers.

Lilabai
and her husband Bhagu have nine children – the oldest is 23, the youngest is 4.
“Everyone at home felt that a son is needed to provide support in old age and
so I have eight daughters and one son,” Lilabai says. “We find it difficult to
bear the cost of bringing up all the children and pay for their education. But
what can be done? I was helpless because in our community it was considered
most important to have a son.”

After fetching water, Lilabai turns to her tasks
in the kitchen. Like many houses in this village, her dwelling too has a low
door – you have to bend down to enter. 
Inside, the floor and walls are plastered with dung. A three-stone stove
is in a corner next to some earthen pots and a few pans. Two buffaloes are tied
to bamboo poles in an adjacent shed.

“I
have to cook for 11 family members. The bullocks have to be fed, dung has
to be removed,” she says. Cooking twice a day – a meal usually consist of bhakris made of bajra or nachni, a vegetable and rice – can take up to
three hours of Lilabai’s and her daughters’ time.

After
returning from the anganwadi, she works on their two-acre farm
till 7 p.m. “Threshing, digging up, weeding, planting paddy saplings – I do all
this work. My husband ploughs the fields and works on the bunds to hold water.
All this has to be done by November. We get about 4 to 6 bags of rice [for the
family’s consumption, not for sale], but that is not enough for us.” 

Bhagu Memane, Lilabai’s husband, adds, “We
cannot live only on our own farm produce. So we work as labourers for others,
planting paddy. We earn Rs. 150 a day. But this work is only for a month.”
After the paddy is harvested by December and till the start of the monsoon in
June-July, water and farm work are both scarce.  A few families in the village then cultivate other
crops like bajra,
and Lilabai and her husband work on their fields as daily wagers when work is
available.

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Twice a week, Lilabai walks around 10
kilometres to a forest to bring back 7 to 10 kilos of firewood. This can take
nearly four hours. Some of the wood is stored for the monsoon months, the rest
is used every day.    

From
March to May, most of the women in the village collect fruit from the hirda (black or chebulic myrobalan)
trees in this area. The berry-like oval fruit is used in ayurvedic medicines. In
March, Lilabai collects the fruit after completing her anganwadi tasks, and when the anganwadi
is closed in April and May, she finishes housework and collects  hirda from
10 a.m. to 6 p.m., along with her daughters. 

In
a day, they collect 10 to 15 kilos. The fruit is then sorted and dried, which
reduces its weight to barely 3 or 4 kilos. Local traders pay Rs. 120 per kilo
for the small medicinal fruit, and just Rs. 10 per kilo for the bigger fruit in
May. The family earns Rs. 20,000- 30,000 from this work in the three-month season.


The
anganwadi
work brings Rs. 1,000 a month, but Lilabai gets paid only once in 3-4
months.  “We have to make this money last
for all our needs – groceries, the children’s education, medicines. But this
amount is not enough. We are willing to work more but no is work available
here.”

Now 40, this has been Lilabai’s ceaseless work
routine for three decades. “My parents got me married when I was 13. I wanted
to study, so I continued in school even when I was living with my husband and
in-laws, and passed the 10th standard in 1994. But I was not allowed to study further
because my in-laws felt it would not do to have me study more than my husband
[he had failed his 10th standard]. That was the end of my education.” 

Since
2016, two non-governmental organisations have been running adult literacy
classes in Phalode village. Even after working for long hours, Lilabai
volunteers to teach the village women at these informal classes, often held in
someone’s home. When some  women were
reluctant to take time off from housework to attend the classes,  Lilabai went from house to house to talk to
them. She has helped teach 30 women how to read a bit and sign their names. 

Through
their decades of hard work, Lilabai and her husband have tried to give their
children an education. Their oldest daughter, Priyanka, 23, has a BCom degree
and is preparing for the state’s competitive exams to try and get a government
job. She recently got married and now lives in Alibag. Pramila, 20, has been selected as a
constable in the Maharashtra police force, but has not yet been asked to join
work. Urmila, 18, is studying in Manchar village, around 50 kilometres from Phalode, for a BA
degree.  In 2018, 16-year-old Sharmila
obtained 78 per cent in the Class 10 board exams. Nirmala is in Class 9, Gauri
in Class 6 and Samiksha in Class 1. Their son Harshal is four and goes to the anganwadi where
Lilabai works.

“I keep worrying that I should not fall
short as a parent in giving them a good education, in ensuring their good
health,” she says. “I constantly feel they should not have to suffer like I
have. Our circumstances will change only if they study and get jobs. I can’t
sleep thinking about my children’s future. But the next day, for them, I re-energise
myself and start working again.”

Special thanks to Kiran Moghe and Subhash Thorat for suggesting I
visit Phalode village for this story, and Amol Waghmare for help in getting
around the village.

Lilabai's ceaseless loop of labour

ஓய்வில்லாமல் உழைக்கும் லீலாபாய்

लीलाबाईंचे अनंत कष्ट

لیلا بائی کی بے انتہا محنت

लीलाबाई की अंतहीन मेहनत

লীলাবাঈয়ের অবিরাম শ্রম-চক্র

ଲୀଲାବତୀଙ୍କ ଅସରନ୍ତି କାମର ଧାରା

Phalode

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Lilabai's ceaseless loop of labour

An anganwadi job, household tasks, fetching water, collecting firewood, farm work, gathering fruit – and more. Lilabai Memane of Phalode village redefines the terms 'working woman' and 'multi-tasking'

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