COVID-19 impact: Without a salary since March, this Delhi mathematics teacher now sells bags to make ends meet

A mathematics teacher in Delhi who alleges he hasn't received a salary since March, has now taken to selling cloth bags at a weekly market in Delhi's Dilshad Garden to make ends meet.

According to a report by PTI, Mohammad Faizi, teaches mathematics to students of classes 6 to 8 at a private school and has been conducting online classes but without any salary since the lockdown started.

A resident of Shahdara, the 30-year-old teacher told PTI that he is unable to pay the school fees for his two daughters. Faizi lives in a two-room house with his elderly parents, wife, and two daughters, aged five and 10.

"My friends have helped me financially, but I cannot ask them for more," Faizi said. "We have been managing somehow. I could not pay the school fee of my daughters, so I am teaching them myself now."

Faizi, who took online classes during the day, reached a weekly market in Dilshad Garden on August 25 evening to sell cloth bags made by one of his friends.

"My friends manufacture these bags. He suggested I could sell them in the market and keep the profits," he says, waiting for customers.

Weekly markets in the national capital, which remained shut since March-end due to the coronavirus lockdown, reopened on August 24 after the Delhi government allowed it till August 30 on a trial basis.

Faizi says he can understand why the school would not be able to pay his salary for some time.

"Many families have been rendered jobless due to COVID. Many people like me are unable to pay their children's school fee. So the schools, too, are finding it difficult to pay their teachers," he says.

Faizi underscores that he wants to continue teaching his students,
"I want to teach during the day and do something else in the evening to make ends meet. That's why the weekly market seemed a better idea," he says.

On his first day, Faizi could not sell anything as the police asked vendors to vacate the space after it became overcrowded.

"The coronavirus pandemic has affected millions of lives, I'm one among them," Faizi says. "I just hope that my family remains safe. I cannot afford medical expenses."
--With inputs from PTI