Responding to a crisis in the face of a rigid Government: Oxfam India’s work in Bihar

Oxfam India’s work in Bihar, India in response to the Covid-19 pandemic

Ranjana Das, Oxfam India

The Covid19 pandemic followed by an unprecedented lockdown in India called for an immediate humanitarian response. The double whammy which has thrown India’s poor into immediate food and essentials crisis calls for action where the government, civil society and non-government organizations must come together rising above their individual agenda and politics. The pandemic has particularly hit hard the east Indian state of Bihar.

Here I discuss a few emerging issues as a result of lockdown, Bihar government’s inadequate measures to address them, it’s indifference towards engaging with civil society and NGOs, and how an organization like Oxfam India could still respond to the crisis by adhering to a few important central government directives and appeals.

COVID-19, lockdown and major issues in Bihar

Bihar declared lockdown on March 22^ndtwo days prior to the national lockdown declaration on March 24^th. The major issues that have arisen can be classified into health, loss of livelihood and severe food crisis. Because of the lockdown announced by the Indian government there have been thousands of people pouring into Bihar from different parts of the country and moving to their home villages[1], many having walked for 100 plus miles. It took a few days for the Health Department to set up the necessary infrastructure at district hospitals and sub-district levels for initial screening, isolation and moving people to quarantine centers. At the time of writing this was happening mostly at district hospitals, schools and community centers. In this context contact tracing of the migrant work returnees became one of the most critical issues.

The second major issue due to lockdown is the loss of livelihood, especially for the poor daily wage workers who are engaged in the informal sector within the State (dihadi majdoor). A quick assessment done by a Patna[2]based organization Koshish Charitable Trust[3]across 18 slums, 13 municipal wards and 5 temporary locations in Patna shows that rag-pickers, daily laborers, working in nearby agriculture fields, construction workers, vegetable sellers, street vendors and domestic workers (who are mainly women) have no work because of the lockdown and hence no income which in turn has snowballed into a crisis of survival. They are forced to borrow money from local money-lenders at exorbitant rates of interest or from generous neighbors fin order to buy essentials. Many are reported to be going hungry or managing on just one meal a day. Many are migrants from other parts of the state and do not have ration cards to enable them to use the government provided Public Distribution System’s (PDS) food benefits.

Response of Bihar government [4]

The initial response of Bihar government was mainly to address the pandemic through the Health Department. One of the very first Health Department orders was to set up 10 isolation beds in each of the district hospitals of Bihar. Contact tracing, testing and treatment started gradually. On the relief front, there was a distribution of cooked food to homeless and destitute people for an initial few days with support from UNICEF. 

The government has also declared a PDS compensation for ration card holders. However, it excludes a large number of people who do not possess a ration card or any other documents like Below Poverty Line [BPL] cards to enable PDS access. A recent report by the economists Jean Drèze and Reetika Khera[5]states that over 100 million people in India and 18 million people in Bihar have been excluded from the PDS because an outdated 2011 census data is being used to calculate State-wide National Food Security Act (NFSA)[6]coverage which requires holding a ration card. Restricting the PDS coverage to ration card holders will mean excluding this 1.8 million in Bihar from the food security coverage during this hour of crisis.

To date the Government of Bihar is not allowing civil society groups/NGOs to distribute any relief materials including food. To confirm this a letter (dated April 1^st2020) was issued by the District Collector of Darbhanga district. This letter stated that (1) the Chief Minister Office had announced that no NGO will be allowed to work on COVID19 relief (2) that all relief has to be channeled through the government and (3) that the permits issued to local NGOs for food distribution will be revoked.

Oxfam India and Humanitarian response of COVID-19

Oxfam India is therefore working under severe constraints. Our first step under the lockdown situation has been to activate our local NGO partners at the community level. Since there has been a restriction issued from the State Government, we requested that our partners collaborate with the local District Health Department for mass awareness and the District Collector for relief distribution. Two of our partners in the districts of Madhubani and Kishangunje collaborated with the District Administration and Health Department to run an awareness campaign[7]across villages on COVID19 symptoms, using the Health Department issued IEC[8]materials, the importance of quarantine, social distancing and WASH[9]practices. They secured permission from the District Collectors to distribute dry rations and in both districts could reach out to 300 of the most vulnerable families including no-ration card holders, homeless and destitute. We have prioritized such families when distributing dry rations. These 300 families included 35 of those who were stranded in Madhubani station and could not move to their villages due to lockdown[10].

On March 30^th, a letter[11]was issued by Amitabh Kant, CEO NITI Aayog,[12]appealing to civil society organizations in India to come forward to help with providing food (cooked and dry), essentials and WASH services to people in need. This allowed us to distribute dry rations to 1100 families between April 4^thto April 8^th.

Moving on

Despite the letter by NITI Aayog, we are yet to receive any green signal from Bihar Government on engagement of civil society and NGOs despite several appeals. We continue our work on the basis of this and another recent letter[13]dated April 8^thfrom NITI Aayog where they have asked to designate a Nodal Officer in each District level to coordinate with local NGOs. We are also working closely with the Inter Agency Group[14]drafting an appeal to Bihar government to formally engage with civil society for COVID19 response.

Bihar government’s silence is deafening every time a disaster has struck the state. From 2019 floods to this year’s COVID19 pandemic they remain indifferent with their inadequate measures and apathy towards engaging with civil society. The Bihar Government urgently needs an integrated way of working with all groups in order to reach the most vulnerable in these trying times. Civil society/NGOs (with their credibility, community network & outreach and volunteer base) can reach groups who remain overlooked and excluded by government policy and rules. A Government-NGO collaboration would be a most welcome move to fight COVID19.

Mouzayian Khalil : 05 May 2020 14:00 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Understanding social realities through gender transformative and participatory research methods

Diya Dutta[1]

In the summer of 2019, Oxfam India embarked upon an innovative research to understand the intersection between women’s unpaid care work burden and violence against women and girls. The study was conducted in rural and urban areas of the northern state of Rajasthan in India.

It was innovative because we applied a gender transformative and feminist participatory research lens to this problem. By this we mean that the study was grounded in feminist principles of social equality and justice, a belief that women and socially excluded groups are agents of change, and an intersectional and contextualised approach to conducting the research.

The Social Norms of Diagnostic Tool[2]devised by Oxfam was adopted to guide the Focus Group Discussions (FGDs). In-depth Interviews (IDIs) were also conducted to cover groups who could not be covered by the FGDs and also to triangulate the data. It is an innovative method which consists of a set of participatory exercises that identify and discuss social norms, perceptions and expectations that shape, constrain or promote sexual harassment and gender based violence in relation to unpaid care work. It involved several participatory activities which provided space for the agency of the community women to be expressed through role plays, short games, storytelling and group work.[3]

The ideal Social Norms Diagnostic Tool is a 2-day event with the same set of participants. We considered hosting a 2-day event but realised that unless the workshop is made residential, it would not ensure continuity. Residential workshops have their own set of challenges in India, from cost implication to women’s safety concerns and therefore the idea of a residential workshop was dropped. Women are also usually not willing to stay overnight as that takes away from their time at home when they could perform domestic duties.

This was the starting point of realising that often the lived realities of poor, marginalised communities are quite different from proposed research methodologies. Methodologies are often drawn within the comfortable meeting rooms of offices and institutions of learning can be far removed from the realities of the communities we seek to understand.

In what follows, I will outline some of the considerations, which informed and enriched Oxfam India’s study, despite us having to improvise and alter the Tool in the course of our fieldwork, which took place in Udaipur, Rajasthan.

The main issue was the extreme time poverty that women face and the long distances they have to travel to come to the workshop site (Rural Udaipur). On an average, they have to walk 10 km to the nearest location from where they can avail a public transport. Buses, and other private transport, aren’t that frequent; once the participants got a transportation it was almost a 2-hour drive to the workshop site. We considered moving the workshop site closer to women; but women were coming from various village panchayats and it would still be very far for some. Also logistical considerations made it appropriate to organise the workshop at our local partner, Aajeevika Bureau’s office.

Women arrived at 11am and by 4pm they were anxious to make their journey back to their villages, before it got too dark. So we got at best 5 hours to conduct the entire workshop with the women. The Tool therefore had to be modified to fit into a day.

In urban Udaipur, we conducted a workshop with poor Muslim women. Here religious restrictions on women’s mobility outside the home posed an impediment for women to openly participate in the workshop. They spent approximately 4 hours at the workshop but were always feeling anxious about what their husbands, family and community would say about them spending time in public for so long. Many women were also too timid to talk about their experiences, fearing some kind of backlash. There were cases of domestic violence but many of them refused to speak about it. Clearly the force of the community was much more evident in their lives than women from Dalit and Tribal communities.

A second issue we observed was the blurring of productive/social reproductive roles in women’s lives. Women mostly brought their young, infant children with them, having no place to leave them. This means women are never not working. Even in the midst of the discussions and role plays in the workshop, women were constantly juggling roles and taking care of their children.

A third issue was of gender segregation. In Rajasthan, a deeply patriarchal society, mixed gender groups would not have worked as the Tool suggests. The women simply would not open up in front of male members. In fact, we observed strict observance of ghoonghat(veil) in rural Rajasthan. If a man from an upper caste community was present among the women or a man from the same caste community as some of the women was present, then the women would immediately veil themselves and stop talking. So we conducted the workshops only with women and girls; and conducted individual interviews with the men and not in the workshop mode.

The other interesting issue is about the very idea of unpaid care work. This is so deeply ingrained in the socialisation process in women’s lives that to conduct a day-long workshop with women on the work they do at home daily was not easy. In some workshops, the women had been given some prior training in gender issues by Aajeevika Bureau. They were more aware of women’s rights issues and therefore the workshop was easier to conduct with them. But we faced some challenges working with older women (50-65 years) with whom prior gender training had not been done. They were evidently uncomfortable discussing the issues of unpaid care work, saying that this is our daily work and part of our identity, what is there to discuss about this? They felt it was a waste of time discussing these issues at a workshop.

Fifth, we were particularly struck by the candour and openness with which women spoke about sexual relations with their husbands. Totally unprompted, during the exercise of listing all the tasks that women do from morning when they wake up till at night when they go to bed, women in more than one workshop volunteered to speak about the need to cater to their husband’s sexual needs as part of their chores! Sex was rarely a pleasure activity for poor, marginalised women yet, a critical element in their lives. If they refuse, they invite the wrath of their husbands and could be victims of violence, just as, if they refused to cook or clean the house.

To sum up, there were generational and social groups (religious groups) intersections in the discussions and we tried to capture these by organising workshops with different social and religious and age groups. While the young adolescent girls found the workshops extremely exciting and the energy levels were very charged, the older generations were less enthusiastic. But there were always overlaps in group characteristics and a diversity of views and ideas emerged from these workshop discussions.

A key takeaway from this research was that in a gender transformative participatory action research, it is always prudent to allow the field to guide the data collection tools rather than the other way round. It makes for richer experience and more nuanced understanding of the problem.

Mouzayian Khalil : 16 Apr 2020 11:14 |  Tags: Gender Participatory Research Methods Social Realities |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

COVID–19 in Multiple Registers

“I won’t die of corona. Before that, I will surely die of hunger”

(Daily wage worker in New Delhi)

Briony Jones, Maeve Moynihan, Oyinlola Oyebode, Shirin M Rai

On March 11 2020, WHO declared the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak a global pandemic. Governments were urged by the WHO to make urgent decisions to reduce the spread of this new disease. These decisions are being made with scarce data and in a politically pressured context. Three things jump out for us in the cacophony around COVID-19: the importance of governance regimes that frame it and are being (re)shaped by it, its effect on our (im)mobilities[1], and the deepening of social inequalities in this time of crisis.

Under pressure and in phases, governments have been announcing compensation packages for different groups of employed (and/or soon to be unemployed) people; “I won’t die of corona. Before that, I will surely die of hunger” or similar was said by many people to Harsh Mander (Delhi activist) as India went into lockdown without any warning and thousands of daily wage earners were left without an income and in numerous cases a home. The Finance Minister declared, ‘no one will go hungry’ and offered 25 million poor women 500 Indian rupees, 5 kg of wheat or rice and 1kg of preferred pulses per month for the next three months to run their households; stretching this meagre resource to feed the family is not going to be an easy task.

Similarly, across the world, the swift action and centralised planning required for an effective response to COVID-19 is being used to justify authoritarian and violent responses against populations in need of protection. A recent article in the Guardian newspaper describes the use of tear gas in India, police shootings in Kenya, and degrading treatment by police to punish curfew ‘violators’ in the Philippines. A statement by 13 European Union Member States on the 2^ndof April said they are “deeply concerned” about the use of emergency measures to tackle the coronavirus outbreak. Not only is the current crisis being used by such governments to justify these acts of violence, but it is normalising undemocratic responses to crises more generally, which affects us all. These effects, however, are not evenly distributed and it is the poorest and most vulnerable who are most affected by lockdowns and authoritarian responses. Those who cannot work from home, or do not have secure contracts or protected salaries rely on being able to travel to find work and to respond to employment opportunities as they arise. A Save the Children report details how families in such contexts have little to fall back on, are unable to stockpile, and some may live in informal settlements which is likely to compromise security and wellbeing during lockdowns. Human Rights Watch has described the extraordinary challenge facing rural-urban migrant workers in India as they have been left without support by the Indian Government, which is failing in its responsibility to protect its citizens, a challenge which faces many other governments across the world.

Since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, over 130 nations around the world have turned to migration management strategies that make refugees, asylum seekers, stateless people, and migrants particularly vulnerable at this time. Across Europe and the globe, countries have closed borders and put strict movement restrictions into place. For those seeking asylum or temporary migratory work, such constraints directly threaten their access to healthcare, safety, and livelihood. Some states, like Portugal, have temporarily extended full citizenship rights to asylum seekers in order to ensure healthcare access. Others, however, such as the United States, have halted asylum claims all together, violating international law and putting individuals at risk. In refugee camps, hundreds of thousands of others, from Rohingya Muslims in refugee camps in Bangladesh to Syrian refugees in the Za’atari and Azraq camps in Jordan, have tried to adapt to the ‘new normal’ in accordance with COVID-19 prevention measures. However, for those living in overcrowded camps with limited access to sanitation, hygiene and social distancing guidelines can be difficult to abide by. Everyday life, as we have argued above, is deeply gendered, making women particularly vulnerable to limited access in times of crises. Long distances to healthcare facilities and lack of provisions only add to the risks for people on the move. For example, the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya is home to over 190,000 displaced people, yet it has just 25 beds for those who contract coronavirus. As the pandemic continues to take shape around the world, it will undoubtedly weave its way camps and settlements across the globe. On April 2^nd, authorities in Greece marked the first known case of COVID-19 in a refugee population and promptly locked down the camp. Given such circumstances, as the UNHCR recently stated, the humanitarian community must ensure that the rights and care of migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, and those on the move are protected during such precarious times.

Non-state responses to the crisis have been mixed; while thousands of people are volunteering to help, we also hear about sectarian, violent and unneighbourly responses to it. The length of lockdown will no doubt affect these responses. The question is whether coordinated, democratic and just responses can emerge and counter the authoritarian crackdown we have seen in some countries. COVID-19 is a global crisis and requires that we respond globally to redistribute resources, equipment, and knowledge not only within countries but between them. If not, the legacies of the current crisis will go well beyond the immediate tragic human loss of life and radically alter the way the governments can justify violence against their own people, and the way the most vulnerable in our communities are treated.

While the virus itself seems to be more dangerous to men than to women, the response to the virus may disadvantage and endanger women particularly – for example, 83% of nurses and midwives in India are women and therefore more exposed to the virus as part of their work. The Institute for Fiscal Studies reports that women, the lowest paid and under 25s are most likely to suffer a decline in living standards due to the lockdown. Lockdowns have also increased women’s burden of domestic and care work; it is not surprising that we are seeing a spike in violence against women and girls in this period of stress, anxiety and increasing poverty combined with lock-downs cutting off escape routes, reducing community safeguarding and preventing time apart to defuse situations. Anxiety is also generating a language of war, which feminists have argued always sets up a hierarchy of needs where women are marginalised or overlooked; urgency privileges the status quo. And status quo is what we do not need just now; what we do need is a change of political discourse that recognise care as work and supports it not with platitudes and ‘clapping for carers’ but with long term and adequate resources that build our social infrastructure. This is a global pandemic and gender inequality is a global issue; both need global solutions that pivot away from short-termism towards investing in health and in equitable and accountable governance. This can only be done through holding governments accountable to delivering a gender sensitive and equitable social infrastructure that will support the needs of all, and not just the few.

One outcome of this crisis could be the further loosening of regulation on key issues - the environment, group discrimination, targeting of migrants andethnic minorities as sources of the virus or spreading it because of ‘cultural’ differences, health and safety and minimum protections - in the name of reviving the economy. In his play Rhinoceros Eugène Ionesco reminds us of the threat of being swayed by a nefarious ideology as a contagious disease – Rhinoceroization. Today’s crisis is also being mobilised by right-wing populists, through communalising public discourse, garnering more power for individual leaders, overlooking many vulnerable communities, and through undermining democratic institutions. This could lead to a rollback of hard fought and won rights, which must not be allowed.

We could, of course, also see a more radical and progressive visions of how we function as a global society, from a slower pace of life, to alternative ways of working, to supporting our public social infrastructure and a more equitable distribution of resources. Already, there is a growing sense of people respecting what public institutions such as the NHS can do to help us in this time; the welfare state is needed to support the growing ranks of unemployed and the charities continue to be a third sector helping the most vulnerable. As after World War II, there could be a recognition that the state and society have to be critical actors in the economy, that participative politics is valuable and needed to hold states and businesses accountable and that ‘the big society’ is not just a slogan but is supported by a social infrastructure for all who wish to contribute to building a caring and equal society. As a recent Financial Times editorial underlined: "Radical reforms - reversing the prevailing policy direction of the last four decades - will need to be put on the table. Governments will have to accept a more active role in the economy. They must see public services as investments rather than liabilities, and look for ways to make labour markets less insecure. Redistribution will again be on the agenda; the privileges of the elderly and wealthy in question. Policies until recently considered eccentric, such as basic income and wealth taxes, will have to be in the mix."

Which of these competing visions take hold will determine how we deal with the post-COVID-19 world and its complex needs.

Mouzayian Khalil : 10 Apr 2020 16:03 |  Tags: Coronavirus Inequalities Social Distancing And The Poor |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem