50 jobs, 30 years: The unseen labour of an Indian female worker

Such examples in India are few and far between. There’s the 52-year-old Self Employed Women’s Association (Sewa), a membership-based organisation that unites poor, self-employed women in the informal economy. There are self-help groups of home-based workers and micro-finance to support them. “But these schemes have really not helped them when it comes to employment,” says Ms Mazumdar.

In 2009, women in Delhi who shelled and cleaned almonds from homes stopped working, external, demanding better pay and overtime, among other things. (They were paid 50 rupees for cleaning a 23kg bag for 12-16 hours.) The strike paralysed the almond processing industry at its peak season.

A study, external in Tamil Nadu state by social scientist K Kalpana illustrated how home and neighbourhood-based female workers subcontracted to make appalams (papadum) in Chennai successfully defended their rights, despite government agencies ignoring claims of trade unions.

Syeda X and her friends had no such luck. “If she ever took time off to nurse an illness or to attend to her children, her job would be lost to another faceless migrant, fighting to take her place,” writes Ms Dixit. Displacement and hardship were the only constants in her life, shifting from job to job and home to home.

Follow BBC India on YouTube, external, Instagram,, external Twitter, external and Facebook, external.