Tasleem hasn’t taken a bath in three weeks, or received his wages for two months.
He has been living the life of a destitute at Banappa Park, in the heart of the city, since then. Tasleem, well into his 50s, had left his worldly belongings behind when he fled the Bangalore Turf Club three weeks ago. He is not alone here — there are close to 300 others for whom life has been hell last few weeks.
“I can’t possibly return to my native village (in Kishengunj district, Bihar). I have been eking out a living here for the last 30 years,” says Tasleem. Tasleem is one of the 900-odd syces (horse attendants) at the Bangalore Turf Club, who have been on the run since February 15 when trouble broke out at the Race Course Road institution.
The travails of Tasleem and his comrades began following a disagreement over the issue of an employment contract that the BTC authorities wanted them to ink. The bone of contention was a clause in the draft agreement that stipulated a penalty on attendants in the event of the death of a horse. Tasleem and other workers allege that the BTC would have been able to impose charges without adequate medico-legal proof.
On February 14, negotiations between the BTC management and the workers fell through. Heated words were exchanged, followed by trading of blows. After the tension subsided, the syces retreated to their quarters. The backlash, the attendants contend, came when they expected it the least — at night.
“The management unleashed the police and its own goons on us. We fled in what we were wearing at the time, and with whatever little money we had on our person,” says Nahid Alam. “I had just 20 bucks on me,” chips in Shamshad. Since then, most workers have been taking shelter at Banappa Park. There are others staying at nearby mosques. Most workers are migrants, mostly from Bihar.
Tasleem, who has been a BTC horse attendant for more than three decades, is resentful. “Our lives are worse than that of dogs.” The average syce here earns Rs4,835 (his counterpart in Kolkata earns nothing less than Rs8,000), and is assigned to a horse 24/7.
The quarters are attached to the stables, and attendants are on call throughout the day. There are no sick leaves, or any for medical exigencies. There are reports of workers succumbing to injuries after being kicked by horses. “This is how our friends Mahtab and Sahdev died,” says an attendant.
The workers have been living off the meagre contributions made by trade unions and human rights activists. But those are only enough to take care of food and sheets that they have been using to sleep in the park. “The sleep is nothing like a walk in the park — there are rodents around. Some have even seen snakes,” says Nahid.
The litany of woes has been rendered worse by people the syces thought were their own. Tasleem has seen as many as six unions in 30 years. “Union leaders usually play both ways,” says a syce. “They promise the moon to us, and then go about implementing the management’s sinister game plan.”
Activist Jagadish Chandra says: “All these vulnerable migrant workers have been thrown out of the premises of the Bangalore Turf Club and the government has treated them shabbily, with the utter disregard for principles of natural justice, human rights and least of all the labour laws and statutes.”
Srivarna, one of the few Kannadigas around, believes the workers aren’t asking for too much. “All we want is for the wages to be hiked to a respectable Rs7,000, and the contentious clause to be removed,” he says. Srivarna, who has been a horse attendant for 35 years, has been getting Rs4,835 for as long as he can remember. Lawyer-activist Narasimha Murthy avers: “We will go by what the labour commissioner has to say.”
So when the glitterati trooped in for the Turf Invitation Cup last week, the lives of the syces hanged by a thread. The success of the event had little to do with the desolation of the syces. Some 100 had, in any case, stayed back at the cash-rich Bangalore Turf Club on the insistence of the authorities. A 100-odd were brought in from other cities to avoid hitches. The Cup had its media moment, and the workers’ travails glossed over.
More than 100 attendants, primarily from Bihar, have returned to their homes. “The uncertainty got to them,” says a worried Tasleem. “But they will return if the stalemate is resolved,” adds a hopeful Nahid.
Hope, however, prevails. The grounds are abuzz with workers pondering about what’s happening at a meeting that has been called to thrash out the issue. The drone fades into silence as there is word that one of their representatives has just walked in.
You can almost hear a pin drop, as apprehensive workers crowd around him giving out the news — they might have to wait for a day or two more. The standoff may end soon.
