Struggle for survival
In the evening, just a few days back, a nine-year-old girl Sompa Rani Das was trying to collect water in her vessels from Ramakrishna Mission, Motijheel. She was so thin that she looked like one suffering from malnutrition for many days. ‘What do you do?’, I asked Sompa. What she said was really heart-rending. She said that she had been serving as a domestic help for three years. Her chores include washing clothes, sweeping floor, cooking, going to kitchen market, collecting water and more. She said that her employer was a malicious person. They torture her every now and then and lock her inside the room when they go out. She eats her meals after everyone finishes his/her meals. Sometimes she does not have anything to eat. She gets up early in the morning, but sleeps late at night. She said that she had nobody to turn to except her maternal grandmother as she lost her parents. Her grandmother is sick. She sent her to Dhaka to help her financially, said Sompa. She has never attended school. It seems that her struggle for survival began the very day she was born. It is obvious that those middle class people do not consider poor children as human beings, she said. They are always treated like animals everyday.
There are laws for domestic helps in our country, but they are rarely implemented. Hence, it is also imperative that the government implement these rules and do something for these hapless children.
Bipul K Debnath
Dhaka
