These observations come from living in a middle-class apartment as a member of the “ladies of the apartment” WhatsApp group. The group is primarily meant to help fellow residents who are looking for information like contact numbers of electricians, plumbers, cooks, dance and yoga classes, tuitions for kids, and other such day-to-day requirements.  However, the group doubles as part spirituality/part religiosity spreading, part political ideology cheering and promoting group essentially acting as a tool in the hegemonic dispensation of the current day. A cursory glance at the content gives out the message that this group representing the ladies of the apartment is essentially a right-wing, Hindu religious group. However, there is a lot more to this bubble of solidarity found on the grounds of religion. When some communal messages were circulated in the group, there was some, if only minimal, opposition to sharing them, and the solution offered by peacekeepers of the group was “let’s keep the group out of politics,” as though politics meant disagreements. However, when it came to the issue of their struggles with the help/maids, everyone agreed, unanimous in their opinion, that extracting work from maids is becoming a problem and that together, a strategy should be arrived at to reign over them.

Through personal conversations and WhatsApp chats, one can sense the resentment and scorn over the nature of incentives that the lower-class women of my state (Karnataka) receive. Most complaints are about how it is difficult to find and retain maids and how free bus rides for women have become a pain for them as the maids leave their hometowns once every fifteen days. There are a couple of instances when residents have raised the issue of having a quarrelsome and thankless help. Their problem is that the maids are not behaving. One resident even recorded a part of the altercation when the maid spoke and shared it in the group, saying, “See how it is.” Then there is a deluge of responses; some sharing about their previous experiences with such unruly maids, some complaint about how such maids will go out to spread rumours about their employers and ensure no one works for them, and some demanding that the apartment should blocklist such maids so they don’t even enter our otherwise very docile premises. None of the many doctors, high-cadre government officials, entrepreneurs, and IT giants who live in the apartment felt the need to check our power position, blocklist a maid, and take away her right to work and life. Those messages also requested the residents not to listen to or allow the maids to talk with them as they are good at spreading rumours about some families. Though the option of blocklisting was cheered and approved by many, it didn’t materialize. It is not because of antagonism but just how new ideas discussed and proposed fizzle off at some point.  Forwarded messages about how taxpayers’ money is being misused in the form of government guarantees to lower classes abound. There were even messages to have a shared agreement on how much one should pay to the maids and to keep that information open, just in case someone unknowingly pays them extra. In all, lurking under our right-wing propaganda group or running parallel to it is this narrative that maids are increasingly becoming unruly and that policies meant to alleviate the standards of the lower classes are, in fact, villainous strategies.

In the technocratic city and the universes of middle-class gated communities with relatively homogenous and not-so-hierarchized caste groups in terms of social status, religion could conveniently sideline the caste differences. The larger homogenization project of the religion, by keeping at bay the many axes of differences – like region, caste, and gender – could bring about a significant number of varied social groups together, thus giving more ammo and strength to such grouping, especially in the kind of politics that they would indulge in and push for. However, it is not apparent that under the guise of a religious solidification project, active boundary-making to their class and class politics is being pushed for. Class is the site, a tool working actively to forge alliances under the broader umbrella of religion. What is particularly unique to this kind of situation from worldwide class politics is the complementarity of religion and class-based politics in India, i.e., class politics are pursued under the guise and with the help of religion in India. The politics of the Hindu right wing, although it appears to be solely invested in bringing different Castes of varied socioeconomic backgrounds, it is invested in nourishing and retaining class differences. Unless the class politics of the larger Hindu grouping are tackled head-on by disclosing them and making it clear where the boundaries are being constantly created and guarded, it is difficult to break the Hindu-right-wing domination of the day. The ‘othering’ based on religion, apart from giving numerical strength, is acting as a façade to undertake class politics.

References:

Upadhya, C. (1997). Social and Cultural Strategies of Class Formation in Coastal Andhra Pradesh. Contributions to Indian Sociology, 31(2), 169-193.

Baviskar, A., & Ray, R. (eds.). (2020). Elite and Everyman: The Cultural Politics of the Indian Middle Classes. Taylor & Francis.

***

Sahithi Sanaka is a Doctoral researcher at the Ashoka Trust for Research in the Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bangalore, and Manipal Academy for Higher Education (MAHE), Manipal. She works on the politics of conservation, focusing on protected areas in India.