How a series of unfortunate events paved journey between Jharkhand and Gurgaon for domestic help

“I was fed up with my father’s barbs over not earning. My elder brother could not work because of an injury and two of my other siblings are very young. We asked our uncle, who took us to Delhi, where my sister and I were placed in different households to work as domestic helps. I spoke to her once. Later, her phone remained switched off. I assumed things would be fine, but we were wrong. On Thursday, I found that my sister had been brutally beaten up and hospitalised.”

She said she is treated well by her employers, and earns Rs 12,000 a month, which she deposits in her brother’s account. “The money was used for his surgery and running household expenses,” she said. “But if the (Jharkhand) government provides us jobs, I would like to work in my hometown.”

The family survives on meagre earnings from farming and selling firewood. At the family home, the victim’s elder brother, aged 25, said that their father has a drinking problem and would often scold them for “not earning and eating all the food”. “My two sisters were fed up,” he said, adding that he had no inkling his sister was in trouble.

“We thought there must have been an issue with her phone. But since our own relative had taken her, we didn’t think anything was wrong,” said the brother, who had been working odd jobs until early last year till he developed a leg issue.

The uncle who took the girls to Delhi said: “I have been called to the police station in Gurgaon and I am cooperating with them. I can’t speak anything more.”

Many in their village said migration to big cities due to lack of jobs is common.