By the time Meena finishes washing the last steel plate in her employer’s kitchen, the afternoon sun has already begun to soften. Her workday, however, is far from over. There are still three more houses to clean, two meals to cook, and a long walk back to the one-room home she shares with her family.

Meena is a domestic worker. She is also Muslim. In modern India, those two identities often intersect in ways that quietly shape how safe her life feels. “I don’t wake up thinking I am Muslim first,” Meena says. “I wake up thinking how much work I have, how much money will come this month.”

For lower-income Muslim women working as domestic help, life unfolds behind closed doors but under constant social scrutiny. Their labour remains invisible, but their identities are frequently politicised.

“The work is the same. The feeling is not.”

Asked whether it is difficult to be a Muslim woman today, the women do not answer in abstract terms. For them, difficulty is cumulative—built over years of small encounters. “Earlier, people only asked if I could cook veg or not,” says Munnira, a domestic worker in the suburbs of the National Capital.

“Now they ask more things; in fact, many people address me as Mamta, because Munnira sounds like a Muslim name,” she tells The Mooknayak in a fast-paced voice. The work itself has not changed—mopping floors, washing utensils, cooking meals. What has changed, she says, is the atmosphere. “The work is the same. But the feeling is not.”

Antra Khatoon, a 20-year-old from West Bengal, describes the difficulty as quieter but sharper. “Sometimes nobody says anything directly,” she explains. “But you feel it. You feel you are being watched more.” She has been working as a maid for two years now in the Nathupur district of Gurugram, Haryana.

When the conversation turns to politics, the women are careful but clear. They say the suspicion they now sense between communities does not feel organic. “These thoughts didn’t come from our houses,” Meena says. “They are being put in people’s heads.” All three women feel the current political climate is deliberately creating divisions between Hindus and Muslims—divisions that were not central to their daily lives earlier. “Earlier, people fought over water, rent, work,” Munnira says. “Now suddenly everything is Hindu-Muslim.”

What worries them more is that this fear is no longer limited to one community. “We see on the news that even Christians are becoming unsafe now,” Antra adds. “So we understand—it’s not really about religion. It’s about fear.”

They say television debates, viral videos, and WhatsApp forwards have changed how neighbours perceive one another, especially in lower-income localities where rumours spread faster than clarification.

An incident to remember

One such rumour nearly caused a serious communal rift in their own neighbourhood. “A message spread that a cow was slaughtered nearby,” Meena recalls. “People became angry very fast.” For several tense days, life came to a halt. Women were afraid to go out to work. Men gathered in groups. Voices grew louder.

Later, it emerged that the rumour was completely false.

“But by then, the fear had already entered,” Meena says. “Even a lie can break relationships.” No violence took place that day, but the memory has stayed with them. “If it was fake once, it can be fake again,” Meena says. “Every time, the fear becomes real.”

Hijab: A Question of Dignity, Not Debate

In mid-December 2025, a video from a public ceremony in Patna went viral, showing Nitish Kumar apparently reaching out and pulling down the hijab/niqab of a Muslim woman doctor during an official event where appointment letters were being distributed.

This incident created nationwide outrage and also worried the women of the community. Meena stated that she was made aware of the incident some days after, through social media, and wondered if the coming days would be fearful for her. While hijab is not a part of her daily routine, her identity, her name—the lane of her community wondered if this meant harassment towards them was now normalised.

The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) issued a strong condemnation of the act, in a resolution dated December 20, describing it as a serious violation of the woman’s dignity, autonomy, and constitutional freedoms, and demanded an unconditional apology.

As domestic workers, their workplaces are private homes—spaces where power is deeply unequal. Public discussions about Muslim women, especially by political leaders, feel like an extension of that imbalance.

The question of hijab—often reduced to slogans in public debate—plays out very differently in their lives. “For me, hijab is my wish,” Munnira says.

She explains that some employers are uncomfortable with head coverings while cooking. Others do not mind. The negotiation happens daily, quietly, without public arguments. Antra, who sometimes wears a scarf and sometimes does not, finds the global debate around hijab bans disconnected from reality.

On being told that many countries have decided to ban the hijab, Antra is confused. “But then it becomes illegal to follow a religious sentiment? How is that freedom or equality?” All three women reject the idea that banning hijab is liberation. Yet they also acknowledge that poverty limits choice. “When you are hungry,” Munnira says softly, “you think of work first.”

Solidarity beyond religion

Despite rising suspicion, the women resist a singular narrative of division. Their lives are also shaped by friendships that cross religious lines. Antra speaks warmly about her closest friend—a Hindu woman, Radha, who works as a domestic helper in the same area.

“We start together in the morning,” she says. “If something feels wrong in a house, we wait for each other.” That friendship has offered more than emotional support. “Once, a man was behaving badly,” Antra recalls. “She came and stood with me. After that, it stopped.” In neighbourhoods where domestic workers are isolated inside private homes, such solidarity becomes a form of safety.

“Problems don’t ask religion,” Meena says. “Work is work.”

The truth in between

The struggles of Muslim women in India cannot be understood through religion alone. They are shaped by class, gender, and the absence of labour protections. Religion sharpens the edges—but poverty defines the frame. They work without contracts, social security, or legal safeguards. They face wage cuts, sudden job losses, and unsafe work environments.

Added to this is the burden of representation—being treated as symbols rather than workers. “We are just doing our job,” Munnira says. “We clean houses. That is our life.” Their stories do not fit neatly into narratives of victimhood or resistance. They exist in the space in between—where dignity is negotiated daily, where fear coexists with friendship, and where survival depends on constant adjustment.

As Antra prepares to leave for her next house, she adjusts her scarf, picks up her bag, and smiles briefly. “Tomorrow will be the same,” she says. “But we will manage.” For millions of women like her, managing has become a political act in itself, not because they chose it, but because the times demand it.

*All quotes are translated from Bengali/Hindi by the author.