Khadka was almost in tears as he related his plight. “If things continue as they are, we will go hungry,” he said, posing a difficult question, “How long will we have to go without work?”[break]
Khadka, who lives with his sister at Pokhara buspark, has not even been able to pay the rent of the cart since the Maoist shutdown began. Khadka was making Rs 400 a day working as construction laborer before the strike started. With this, he was supporting his family´s upkeep.
“After the strike started, I took this cart on rent hoping to make some money to feed my family. The rent is a hundred rupees per day,” he said. But there is not enough money to even pay the cart´s rent.
He took the cart on rent hoping to ferry tourists´ belongings from Pokhara airport to Lakeside. But his dream of making some money vanished after tour operators took permission of the Maoists to operate vehicles for the same purpose, thus making Khadka´s rented cart redundant.
Understandably, Khadka is angry with both the tour operators and the Maoists for snatching his work. “It is injustice not to let us work. For whose welfare do the politicians work?”
Hundreds of daily wage earners like Khadka have been hit by the Maoist shutdown. Daily wage earners like Bhola Miya and Devi Pariyar say the shutdown is threatening to take away their bread.
Said Pariyar, who is from Baglung, “Either give us work, or give us rice and pay the rent of our rooms.”
The situation of daily wage earners is equally heartrending in Baglung. In fact, workers here are already in the grips of hunger.
The stove of Man Bahadur Darji did not see fire on Wednesday. Darji, who lives in Rangkhani, left home at daybreak and returned home a desolate man at 11 am. "As soon as I reach home, my children pound at me. There is no work, and no one is willing to give food on credit," he complained.
The Darji couple was supporting a family of seven working for daily wages. Darji, who used to work at construction sites, said, "We have harmed no one. We should be allowed to work."
Dozens of daily wage earners liging in Halanchowk, Bhutlebhir, Pensioncamp, Bangechowr and Handepakha of the district face a similar fate.
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