UP Elections: 'Left to Die'- Painful Stories of Taj Mahal Tour Guides

Agra: "We have not earned even a rupee in the last week; we took a loan to feed our family; our children have stopped going to the school- one of them started selling vegetables. We are trying to find an alternate source of income," these are some of the repeated things said by the travel guides at the Taj Mahal, the 17th-century marble wonder, on how they survived the pandemic.

The tour guides at the Taj Mahal survived the pandemic with the maximum hardship owing to the monument's closure for more than six months when the Union government imposed the lockdown in March 2020, in a bid to control the spread of COVID-19 in India. During this time, these storytellers were left with nothing but struggle even harder to make a living for themselves and their families. 

On a sunny winter morning, the NewsClick team met Narendra Gola, a tour guide at the east gate of the Taj Mahal. Gola has been working as a tour guide for the last 13 years but witnessed the worst phase of his life in the previous two years. 

Gola says that he never cared about money ever since joining this profession and realised the value of money only when the Taj Mahal was shut. 

"Earlier, I made at least Rs 1,000/day, but now the income has gone down to between Rs 100-200/day. The international tourists who were our main source of income are not coming, and the domestic ones do not believe in taking tour guides. This has severely affected our lives. The other factor that has affected us is the government turning a blind eye towards us. In the name of help, we have only received the 5 Kg free ration," says Gola.

Gola has six people in his family, including two children. He took a loan to deposit the fee of his children and now is in a debt of Rs 25,000 (interest-free). Gola believes he will pay the loan amount if the tourism industry returns to normal.

 It may be mentioned that the 17th-century wonder generated the maximum revenue in the tourism industry of India. Till December 2019, the Taj Mahal brought over Rs 200 crore, as per figures of the last three consecutive years, but the revenue plummeted when the deadly pandemic hit. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) Agra unit did not give the figure of the revenue generated by the Taj Mahal. The story will be updated when we receive the data. 

 CHILDREN NOT ALLOWED TO SIT IN ONLINE CLASSES

Rashid Khan, 46, has been working as a tour guide for the last ten years, and he is now facing the most challenging time of his life because the school where his children are studying has stopped them from attending online classes. 

"One of my sons is in intermediate, and the other one is studying in class IX. I could not deposit their fees due to which I am under a lot of financial stress. The school did not allow my children to take online classes. Not just this, even providing for the family has become a huge challenge for tour operators like me. In the name of help, we merely received ration. But, we also require things like milk, oil, etc., to run the house," says Khan. 

"Had we got some loan from the government bank, the situation would have been not this hard. The banks did not entertain our requests because they knew we have no source of income and it will be difficult for us to repay the loan."

"Now the elections are approaching, and we hope that the government understands our plight and does something for us; otherwise, we know that the virus is not going to end soon, and this way, we would be left with no options other than switching trades," Khan further says. 

"We wander all day here to find customers and return home devastated. We have told the beautiful love story behind the making of the Taj Mahal, and we return home empty-handed. Our wives fight with us, and our lives get disturbed. We sleep empty stomach to give food to our kids, and that is how we have been living since the last two years," he says.

The tour guides in Agra face an uncertain future due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It usually draws between 7-8 million visitors each year. At least 7,37,000 foreign tourists alone visited the monument in 2019.

But for the last 15 months, except for a brief hiatus last year, the country's top tourist attraction has been shut. People like Gola, Khan, and over 2,500 registered tour guides have had their lives upended, but their issues have not found a place in any of the parties' manifesto or agenda.

"The world believes it was built by love, but reading Shah Jahan's own words on the Taj, one could say it was grief that built the Taj Mahal, and it was sorrow that saw it through sixteen years till completion." Aysha Taryam's writes in The Opposite of Indifference, a quote that seems more relevant in the present context.

Indal Kashyap is a journalism student at the Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti Language University and a freelance journalist. Saurabh Sharma helped in writing the story.