[Reader-list] My Dreams & Experiences- Reflections of Workers’ Organizer

[Kabir Khan]

My Dreams & Experiences- Reflections of Workers’ Organizer
<https://wastenarratives.com/2016/08/13/my-dreams-experiences-reflections-of-workers-organizer/>


*Written by Soubhagya and translated from Kannada to English by Devaki
Samuel, original provided below*

It’s been twenty years since I started working as community organizer. I
started as a teacher for children of 3-6 years of age. I noticed most of
the time older sisters came to drop their younger siblings. The sisters
were beautiful, smart and intelligent but had taken the burden of single
mothers, who were involved in incense stick making. Deprived of education,
instead of holding books, their hands were blackened with the ingredients
of incense sticks.

Whenever I saw them, my heart ached.  I had an opportunity to do something
while working with an Parikrama, an organization which supports education
in English medium boarding school for dropped out children and wards of
poor. I succeeded in admitting incense stick maker- Nandini, sister of
Vijay (student in my class) in the school along with four more girls. I
heard Nandini passed with distinction in 10th standard exam, however others
dropped out of school for various reasons.

In 2011 I began working with Hasiru Dala, an organization of wastepickers
and mostly women. During the course of my work in the community I came to
know about the imminent concerns in their families. They leave home early
in the morning to collect waste from the streets. Return back around 8 in
the morning and serve breakfast to their children. Either previous night’s
leftover dinner is served in the breakfast or bun and biscuits with tea.
They would go back on the street for picking waste and returned for the day
around, 12-1, they sell the collected waste. With the little earning,
groceries for the day are bought. In most of the families, female folks do
all the collection, sale of waste and purchase of provisions. When women
retuned from work with few rupees in hand. The money will eventually reach
husbands hand who are getting up with last night’s hang over. They fight
and beat their wives, snatch away all the earnings for buying liquor. When
we started organizing wastepickers, they shared their bitter
experiences. Continued
here...
<https://wastenarratives.com/2016/08/13/my-dreams-experiences-reflections-of-workers-organizer/>

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Regards

कबीर/کبیر

Phone:00-91-96-63-427-315
Email: kabir.postbox at gmail.com
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