The Doosra Diwali Gift Survey

Social scientists fear it would be incredibly difficult to survive without Google but agree it would be absolutely impossible to survive without domestic helps.

Let’s face it. It’s not the politicians, scientists, IT guys or Rajinikanth but the domestic helps who keep the world going.

The theory may not apply to the West but it has not yet been established beyond satisfaction that West is part of the world. Many Indian tourists in fact exclaim it’s out-of-the-world.

And nothing influences the decision of a domestic help whether to continue her current job or look for a greener pasture than the Diwali gift from her employer, often the female family head, with whom she shares a relation involving diplomatic skullduggery of the highest order.

Indian male family members – universally recognised as easily the selfish, incorrigibly the lazy and absolutely the redundant unit of any household – have no clue about the existential significance of the day after Diwali when the crackers have fizzled out like a Ram Gopal Verma movie at the Box Office and the earthen Diyas resemble one of those once oil-rich nations sucked, democratically, bone-dry by the US.

Doosra conducted a nationwide family survey and came up with some startling facts:

1. 67% male family members said they were not consulted while determining the Diwali gift for the domestic help;

2. 20% male family members said they may have been consulted but don’t exactly recall as the discussion coincided with some football/cricket/tennis/sepak takraw/ muay thai/kalaripayattu thing on TV;;

3. 7% male family members said they were consulted but their Diwali gift suggestion was summarily rejected;

4. 6% male family members refused to comment;

5. Of the domestic helps who reported for duty the day after, 89% sported a sullen look on their face and steadfastly refused to share any neighborhood gossip;

6. Of the domestic helps who did not report for duty, 76% confirmed they were one round of cajoling away from joining back;

7. 76% of the domestic helps who did not join duty, did not take call from their employees, spreading widespread panic and consternation at their workplace;

8. 23% female family heads successfully got rid of old cutlery sets gathering dust in an obscure corner of their cupboard;

9. 79% male members of families hit by domestic help’s absence called their bosom friends to cancel evening gathering citing hostile atmosphere at home;

10. 86% of kids in family’s hit by domestic help’s absence reported above-average scolding and significant rise in slapping, pinching and other popular forms of disciplining a child;

11. 97% apartments witnessed gathering of domestic helps, featuring comparative study of each other’s gifts and assessment of their employer’s character with generous sprinkling of unparliamentary words and phrases.