A session was conducted at the Swabhimaan Kendra in Panipat on 12th November, 2021. The purpose of the session was to share the findings of the needs assessment survey and to initiate discussion on the importance of alternative sustainable livelihood. The objective of the discussion was to create a critical understanding on how they could have their own initiative, which can help them sustain in uncertain times like the Pandemic.
The conversation with the domestic workers also revolved around the utility and resemblance of the ‘Swabhimaan Kendra’ for them. It was discussed that the there are a lot of people who want to start something of their own, but do not have the space to manage it; but, this space is totally dedicated to the women domestic workers, where they could come together in their free time, have their meetings, discuss if they want to start their own business, brainstorm ideas and also spend a gala time together.
Further to this, an activity was conducted with the domestic workers where they discussed ‘what a normal day looks like for a woman and what it looks like for a man.’ The activity was conducted through an exercise called workload analysis.
A watch has been drawn on two chart papers, where the daily activities of men and women, from the time they woke up to the time they go to sleep was discussed. Women started by enlisting their activities and majority of the women wake up between 4am to 6am and on contrary to this, men wake up between 8am to 9am in the morning. While doing the workload analysis, women expressed that they have double burden of work, one being the household and other being the work. Maya, a middle-aged domestic worker said, “I don’t get time to rest properly. I work all the time, but it does not get finished somehow.” Another woman domestic worker Roshni shared, “In the men’s clock there are many occasions where men have free time to relax, chat or to think, we have to chat and think while we are working.”
After that, a comparative analysis was made where a discussion between the domestic workers about who is working harder was conducted. In the discussion, it came out that it was the women who were working almost 20 hours a day. The discussion further led to the conversation around the gender roles and gender stereotypes. It was discussed that society put pressure on women and men to perform certain roles and, that pressure is more on the women.
The women domestic workers were made to think critically that to run any alternative of livlihood which will support them in crisis, they need to create a time window. At the end, it was discussed that how can they create extra hours for them. Most of them expressed that help and support from other family members especially husbands in doing the household work can be useful.