The smoke won’t clear

Kumar is a contract worker,part of the MCD’s temporary workforce that was called in to intensify fogging and fumigation operations across the city a year ago. “I think I’d be happy if they made me a regular staff. Beyond that,I am confused. I think that’s what I’d like the most,” he says. His imagination probably shorted out at that point.

Although he wears the flimsy mask,the smoke finds its way to his lungs. “In maybe ten years,these people get asthma or tuberculosis. That’s how it is,” says S S Verma,a malaria inspector. Kumar would rather not know. He gets Rs 3,600 a month,of which he spends Rs 1,000 to buy his bus pass as he lives in Loni,a far-flung village on the outskirts of the national capital.

Would he have wanted to do something else? He hasn’t had the time to think,he says,ever since his father,also a fumigator,died in 2003 of an ailment. “At one point I wanted to start a hardware shop but my father died and then I had all this responsibility,” he says.

As the city grapples with a dengue outbreak,Kumar and hundreds like him are the foot soldiers in the battle against the disease,the ones who walk around colonies armed with the long-nozzle machine,working more than 12 hours a day trying to cover as much area as possible.

According to a senior MCD official,in Lajpat Nagar Ward No. 155,where Kumar and Devi Ram,another 26-year-old contract worker are deployed,there are about 25,000 homes. That means an average of 50 homes a day for Kumar and Ram.

In H Block,as he clambered onto the fourth floor,Kumar’s pink shirt was drenched in sweat and his khaki polyester trousers stained with grease from the machine. As a contract worker,he isn’t entitled to a uniform,nor does he get paid leave or medical cover.

For the extra hours that he clocks,Kumar has been promised a few days off,but he’d rather get paid. He has a two-year-old son and a two-month-old daughter to take care of. He hopes to send them to school and maybe they won’t end up in a job like his—with no security and lots of smoke. Sundays are working days too.

Kumar’s day begins early. He wakes up at 6 a.m.,packs his lunch and takes the bus to Lajpat Nagar,a journey that takes him about two-and-a-half hours. Then at the ramshackle MCD office and community centre in Lajpat Nagar H Block,the officials give him an area map,mark his attendance,and hand over the machine and the solution. At 9:30 a.m.,he is on his way to the colonies,climbing up five storeys.

Ram,the other man on the job,takes over when Kumar’s hands begin to shake,and he is unsteady with all the smoke that he has inhaled.

They break for lunch later in the afternoon. Residents often ask them to do some more fogging in the basements,in the little alleys adjoining their houses. After sundown,his job changes. Now,he needs to do “outdoor fogging”.

There are around 3,500 contract workers in the civic agency’s health department. In 1996 and 2006,the government had hired hundreds of contract workers to fight the dengue outbreak. Now,they are demanding that they be regularised.

The MCD says it will listen to the demands only after the CWG. But Kumar says he has no time to “fight for his rights”. He can’t afford to lose his job. “I need to take care of my family,” he says. “Maybe if I had continued my studies,I’d have become a sanitary inspector. That would have been the perfect job. If they make me permanent,my salary will be

Rs 15,000. That’s a lot of money.”

As the thick smoke curls around him,his eyes begin to water. He has already finished fogging 37 homes. That’s only about 10-odd buildings. Thirty to go.