Tears without onions

The ‘smell’ that he is talking about lingers on,faint and fleeting,not so strong as before,for,ever since the supplies were hit,fewer trucks carrying onions are coming in from Maharashtra. For Suresh,it means an impending loss of livelihood and an empty stomach on most nights.

Ever since the rains damaged the crop,followed by the raids that the government undertook to rein in profiteering by traders,onion prices have gone up. Fewer trucks have lined up outside the mandi and his shoulders have carried fewer sacks than usual.

Work is less,and so is the money. Suresh,like others,earns Rs 2 a sack. A few weeks ago,he was able to make around Rs 200 a day. These days,it hardly touches Rs 100. “We can’t send money home anymore. There is hardly any work,” he says.

Suresh has worked at Delhi’s Azadpur mandi for almost three decades. Like others,he lives there. Their belongings are hung on poles or piled up against the wall. His eyes no longer water when the rancid smell of the onions strike them. The smell has become a part of his being in the 30 years that he has spent loading and unloading sacks of onions,sleeping on the floor strewn with onions,and getting up with the sight of trucks stacked with onions lining up outside the mandi every morning.

The smell engulfs the floor space,the roof,permeating their bedding and a few rags that the daily labourers own. But Raju,another labourer doesn’t think it is oppressive. “Yeh to khushboo hai. We don’t feel it,” he says. To most of them,the air outside the tin shed stacked with sacks of onions now feels strange.

On Thursday,only 15 trucks lined up. These are lean days for Chaudhury Bhullan Singh’s A-311,one of the 119 onion wholesale retailers at the mandi,where Suresh works with six others.

Before the onion crisis hit the markets,at least 300 trucks from Maharashtra carrying onions would come to the mandi early in the morning and Suresh and his men would rush to them,grabbing the sacks and running to and fro,taking a break for lunch only late in the day. These days,work gets over by afternoon. At A-311,they are lucky they have work,even if it pays little. At other shops,workers sit around,waiting for their trucks.

“We are stuck. There is nothing else we can do,” says Raju,who hails from a village in Mau district,UP. He came to the mandi 12 years ago – the tiny piece of land he owned wasn’t good enough for his family. So,he boarded a train and landed in the Capital with a man from his village,who said working at the mandi would help his family get by.

Every morning,Suresh,Raju and five others go to the nearby Raj Hotel for tea and snacks before starting work. The skin on Raju’s left shoulder has calloused with years of carrying sacks weighing at least 55 kg each. When he was new to the job,his shoulder ached; now,he feels no sensation. “They have become like the skin on my heels,” he says. “Hard and weathered. We are like mules but have no other chance in life.” His left shoulder looks a little tilted,a bit worn. But like the others,he has accepted his lot.

Suresh studied till Class 10 in his village school,but dropped out when he had to help the family. When he came to the mandi,he used to earn 35 paise a sack. In the last three decades,not much has changed in his life. The smell is the constant,and so is the numbness in his left shoulder. “I don’t know if I could do anything else. This is the only work I know,” he says.

At the end of each day,Suresh divides the day’s earnings based on the numbers of sacks each one of the seven workers at A-311 has unloaded or loaded. For five weeks,ever since the onion supplies have taken a hit,they have been taking turns sending money home,pooling in their savings to help a family that might need the money more than the others.

Suresh is the eldest. At 54,he is like the patriarch,the man who has kept them all together. “This mandi is now home,” he says.

He has tried bargaining with the traders. But without any unions,he can’t do that effectively enough. The increase per year is a paltry sum of 20 paise per sack that doesn’t match the spiraling prices of basic commodities. On most days,they debate if they should skip a meal and send money home instead. The dilemma is what is causing pain and a few of them go hungry at times so their families don’t suffer.

They are hoping the crisis gets over soon so that they can return to their usual lives,even if means shooting pains in the shoulder and the back.

At his age,Suresh knows his shoulders won’t last too long. “We sell the strength of our limbs. There’s no savings in this work,” he says. “But what’s the alternative?”

Their work promises no social security,no perks,no bonuses. But there are onions they can pick up,the ones that have fallen on the floor in the chaos of the brisk buying and selling.

“That’s one of the few incentives in this job,” Raju says. “But you still have to buy rice,vegetables and other things.”