Women are sincere workers

Today I was at a local Marathi medium school to interview three peons – all of them women. Even though mid way through the first interview, my participant was sent for by the high school principal, I was able to start and complete a second one right then. Just being among the three peons and having seen them work on the two other occasions that I have visited that school, I just know how sincere and committed they are toward their work. While I was waiting for my first participant to return, I saw the third peon walk up to the school, three flights of stairs carrying two huge and heavy bundles of BalBharati books for standards 3, 4, and 5. Soon after she climbed a few more flights of stairs and carried the books to the respective classrooms and as soon as that was over, she went across the street to get some things photo copied. Meanwhile, the peon I had interviewed completed some work in the principal’s office and then at the appropriate time climed a flight of stairs and rang the school bell signaling the end of that class period. On other occasions, I’ve seen these women make and serve coffee to visitors, arrange chairs and tables for visitors as well as for programs held at the school – and all this in addition to their other regular jobs including keeping an eye on the boys and girls.

When it was time for me to conduct the interview, we needed a couple chairs to be pulled into the room and these were not the chairs with rollers, these were regular wooden chairs and the participant peon insisted on being the one to lugg them all the way and of course I refused and carried my own chair. I could clearly see that this made her uncomfortable. There are several possible explanations for this – could be that I was a visitor to the school and so as host she wanted to be the one playing the perfect host and make things easy for me or it could be that she just didn’t think that a petite woman of 5′2 was capable enough to lift a heavy chair (given that she was at least 5′8 and of athletic built) or it could be positional differences, visible class differences/educational levels or some such effectively differentiating demographic factors. Even so, the interview was progressing well until we were disturbed but then I made the most of the situation and interviewed her colleague, another peon.

The number today is 56 and a half I guess. I am traveling to Mumbai tomorrow and hope to collect a couple more interviews there. Also before I leave tomorrow, I will visit Prabhodini again and complete some necessary work.

Until I return…