The Many Lives of Syeda X: The Story of an Unknown Indian

by Neha Dixit

What does the life of an ordinary working-class Indian look and feel like? In this outstanding book, the award-winning journalist Neha Dixit traces the story of one such faceless Indian woman, from the early 1990s to the present day. What emerges is a picture of a life lived under constant corrosive tension. Syeda X left Banaras for Delhi with her young family in the aftermath of riots triggered by the demolition of the Babri Masjid. In Delhi, she settled into the life of a poor migrant, juggling multiple jobs a day – from trimming the loose threads of jeans to cooking namkeen, and from shelling almonds to making tea strainers. Syeda has done over fifty different types of work, earning paltry sums in the process. And if she ever took a day off, her job would be lost to another faceless migrant.

Researched for close to a decade, in this book, we meet an unforgettable cast of a rickshaw driver in Chandni Chowk who ends up tragically dead in a terrorist blast; a doctor who gets arrested for pre-natal sex determination; a gau rakshak whose sister elopes with Syeda’s son; and policemen who delight in beating young Muslim men.

In the end, things comes to a grotesque full circle for Syeda. Her life is upturned for the umpteenth time during the Delhi riots of 2020. But displacement, tragedy and hardships are the things she is used to – being poor and Muslim and a woman. Written with empathy and deep insight, this book is a portal to a harsh world hidden away from elite Indians. It is the story of untold millions and a searing account of urban life in New India.

Genres: India, Nonfiction, Biography, Indian Literature

369 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 31, 2024

Reviews

[Nandakishore Mridula · Rating 4 out of 5]

She is Syeda. Syeda X. No surname, no other identifiers. She is a penurious Muslim woman in today's India, thus thrice disadvantaged: through gender, social status and religion. She is one of the creatures who exist in the dark underbelly of this nuclear-armed nation which sends rockets to moon and mars, and which likes to style itself as an up-and-coming superpower. She is modern India's source of shame.

Yet, she exists - along with millions like her. They power this nation: keep its wheels turning and its kitchen fires burning. The prosperity of the so-called upper-class is built on the abject misery of people like her.

Syeda was born into a family of traditional weavers in Benares, India's holy city. It is these Muslim weavers in Benares who make those famous Benares Silk Sarees, prized very highly by the women of India. Married to a man chosen by her family at fifteen, and a mother of three children in quick succession, Syeda would have lived the average Indian woman - neither happy nor unhappy, but a enjoying tranquil existence enlivened once in a while by a Bollywood movie - had not the Babri Masjid been demolished by a crazed mob of Hindu fundamentalists in December 1992.

Unlike the image projected to the world at large, India is not a haven of religious tolerance - it never has been. Hindu fundamentalism has been around since 1925, and has been growing in strength to strength ever since. The Babri Masjid, a mosque built allegedly by destroying a temple to Rama by Babur, the first Mughal emperor of India, was a rallying point for the Hindu bigots. They had been demanding its demolition and the building of a temple in the same spot; and they were successful in tearing it down on 6th December, 1992, as the authorities looked the other way.

There were riots - or rather, pogroms against Muslims in various parts of India. The police in the northern states, already heavily indoctrinated with Hindu fundamentalism, let it happen - sometimes, they even actively participated. However, ultimately when the long arm of the law intervened, it was Muslims who were invariably arrested and charged. Syeda's family lost all their looms in mob attacks, and her husband Akmal, who was loafing about in dargah (a Sufi shrine), was arrested and charged.

Akmal's family blamed him for the mishap. Already something of an idler, his brothers took this as an opportunity to push him out of the family business. Akmal, Syeda, and their three children moved to India's capital city Delhi - the "black hole" which swallows immigrants. There, they moved from one filthy slum to another, as they tried to keep their body and soul together - what "living" means for the underprivileged in India.

Akmal, unaccustomed to hard labour, quickly succumbed to a life of idleness and alcoholism. Syeda's sons dropped out of school, because they didn't have the means to study and because they were continuously targeted because of their religious identity. (Most people don't realise it, but for a Muslim in North India [the so-called "cow-belt"], life is one continuous struggle against discrimination and prejudices.) Only Reshma, Syeda's daughter, continued her education.

Meanwhile, Syeda was carrying out the laborious job of keeping her family afloat. Working in the unorganised sector, with no job protection or benefits, in "factories" which are dark and dank sweatshops lacking even a toilet, and spurning the unwanted attentions of lecherous employers, many women in India make ends meet - all the time manufacturing products piecemeal for many multinational corporations who make a killing on them. Syeda became one of these faceless women, manufacturing everything from bindis to doorknobs to electronic items.

But as India moved into the 21st century, the condition of her Muslim minorities went from bad to worse. Pogroms, lynchings, false arrests, destruction of property - the fundamentalists were having a field day. With the ascension of Narendra Modi as Prime Minister in 2014, and the formation of a government by the Hindu "nationalist" Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the atrocities could now be carried out in broad daylight with blessings of the authorities. And Syeda and her family continued to be at the receiving end, as they moved from tragedy to tragedy, finally culminating in the Delhi riots of 2020. Yet, she continues...

(For those who are not familiar with the BJP: they are the political arm of the RSS [Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh], a cultural organisation modelled on fascist lines. They go by the philosophy of "Hindutva", which stipulates that India belongs to Hindus. They are against secularism, and fans of both Nazism and Zionism. Now try to wrap your heads around that!)

But even with such distressing content, this book is strangely uplifting - because Syeda stands tall even in the face of overwhelming adversities. And the steel in her has been inherited by Reshma, who completed graduation braving all odds and seems to be intent on carrying her mother's torch into the future. It seems that the future of India depends on her daughters.

The author, Neha Dixit, spent almost nine years, travelling with Syeda and chronicling her life and times. Soon, she began to be stalked and threatened with acid attacks and gang rape. There was a break-in attempt into her home, which the Delhi police dismissed as "imaginary". Only natural, in today's India.

When Neha told this to Syeda, she replied: "Ignore it. Dogs bark, but the elephant moves on."

Indeed!

(PS: I had the pleasure to meet the author and get a signed copy of the book from her, at a literary fest in Thiruvananthapuram.)

[Nivedita · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just finished this extraordinary book about an ordinary Indian - who juggles 2-3 jobs a day to earn a meagre amount at the end of the day, who works in the most precarious conditions and has no protection, who has zero benefits in terms of medical insurance, social security, or job security. This journalistic story is based on 900 interviews, consultations, and group discussions with Delhi's migrant population, but focused on one of them who seems to be quite ordinary but is at the trifecta of oppression: she is poor, a woman, and Muslim in India. She is Syeda X.

As a Hindu poor, lower-caste man, your prospects in this country are close to nil due to the inherent biases against the poor. As Hindu, poor, lower-caste woman, you have no independence, no job, and always left behind in the discussions. Yet these two categories wouldn't face an existential threat in this country to the extent that a Muslim, poor woman would, especially with the Hindutva narrative spread across the country.

The book brilliantly covers all three aspects of Syeda that define her in this political climate. First, as a woman, she is married off at a young age, not to become a burden to her family. Then as a Muslim, she fled from her native Banaras after the Babri Masjid riots to move to Delhi and became one of the thousands of migrant population who move here looking for better means of making a livelihood. And finally, the meagre amount of money that she makes means that she is on the lowest rung of the economy, depending on two, three, and four jobs to support her family.

In between, you come across her family members, her friends, her various bosses, and people who think her religion does not make her an Indian. You see stories that you may see or hear every day, but have become so desensitized to that you no longer want to think about them. Not writing like a researcher, but as a journalist gave it a very personal touch as well.

[Natasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Women are almost relegated to the footnote when discussing workplaces and livelihoods in India, and even that extremely barren landscape is dominated either by urban white collar workers, or rural labourers. In “The Many Lives of Syeda X”, author Neha Dixit turns the spotlight on the urban migrant worker who invariably slips through the cracks while reporting on female participation in the workplace. The book goes way beyond the statistics and occasional news stories, and by telling the story of one woman, Syeda X, over a thirty year period, shows exactly what it means to live on the margins in urban India.
Syeda migrated to Delhi with her husband and three children from Varanasi after the riots of 1992. When she realised that her husband was incapable of providing for the family, she took on the mantle of becoming the primary wage earner. Over the next thirty years, she had over 50 jobs- many seasonal, all exploitative and none with any security. It was upto her to train herself and procure the tools of each trade, and she had the job only as long as she was willing and able to produce consistently. There are millions like Syeda, but none of them show up in official statistics, because they do not consider this "work".
The book also uses the story of Syeda to talk about various social issues, especially the status of women and growing communalism.
This book is one that everyone who is keen to know more about the country should read.

Detailed Review here: https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2024/09/...

[Moon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would recommend reading this book to everyone!
It’s gripping narrative, it’s through investigative reporting and shedding light on important issues in today’s political climate makes it every bit an essential read for young generation.
While we live away in our privileged world, there are people struggling to survive day to day, to feed their families, to nurse their wounds.
It talks about much needed political polarisation, Hindu supremacy, about casteist and religious extremism by the powerful upper cast Hindu majority.
It talks about women and their rights and how all religions want to keep them under control.
It talks about yearnings of lower income families, their desire to fly high but always getting their wings clipped by one thing or another.
I couldn’t keep it down for longer period and kept coming back to it after short intervals.
Book addresses in detail about everyday life of migrant workers, their contributions to economy and how they are always sidelined. It talks about authoritarianism, poverty and inequality.
Only complaint is, it jumps years abruptly and leaves one a bit confused.

I hope it gets translated to other Indian languages as this is an important story everyone should read.

[Ila · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Delhi, the national capital, has forever been explored through the eyes of its rulers - either via the charms of the Mughals or the power corridors of New Delhi - but hardly through the eyes of the roughly 35000 poor migrants who come to the city every day, never to return.”

‘The Many Lives of Syeda X’ traces the life of an ordinary Muslim woman who migrates from Banaras to Delhi in search of work. Neha gives us a glimpse into some of the fifty-odd jobs Syeda picks up for meagre wages to make ends meet. We learn how jeans are made and dyed, how almonds are extracted, how sweatshops and pre-natal sex determination clinics work, how factories employ (and exploit) home-based workers - mostly women, how hindutva brews in neighbourhoods, how young people are pulled into its fold, and so much more. We also learn about each of her family members, their desires, their lives.

Neha’s meticulous documentation brings alive an entire mohalla, and through it, the city and country. The book is heartbreaking, insightful, and important, and makes visible what we refuse to see and acknowledge as we go about our daily lives. Please read it.

[Manu · Rating 4 out of 5]

'The Many Lives of Syeda X' is the kind of book that forces one to look at one's privilege at an individual level, and holds a mirror to all of us at a societal level. Neha Dixit has researched this book for nine years, and the breadth and depth of her 900+ interactions, and her thinking, is evident in the structure and narrative of the book.
It is, as the cliche goes, the voice of the voiceless - the people whose desperate toils to survive, we deliberately look away from or pretend not to see, because it is a reality we will find difficult to face if we consider ourselves human. I call it sub-human because, from our gated vantage point, in a nation whose GDP chest-thumping and gleaming malls and fancy consumer goods belies the struggle of the large majority of its population, people like Syeda exist in conditions that are perilous in terms of income, health, and safety. A poor, Muslim, woman.
Syeda's life represents the struggles of the millions of 'invisible workers' in the country. The book follows her from Benaras, where the 1992 Babri Masjid-related riots upend 'the warp and the weft' that made up the handloom industry, and in the process, her life and work. Along with her husband and three children, she is forced to move to Delhi, a decision practically made for her by the person at the railway station ticket counter.
In the next three decades, we see her forced to move through fifty low-paying and exploitative jobs - stitching jeans, making bindis and stationery, shelling almonds. Holding multiple jobs at the same time with very little job security or safety. She is part of India’s informal economy, working in subhuman conditions with no formal contracts or labor rights. Extremely vulnerable, and way beyond hand to mouth. The section about the strikes to get Rs.10 extra is poignant.
It's not just the economics, it is also the compounding marginalisation of two other parts of her identity, if at all she has one - being Muslim, and being a woman. From her own family (including her husband) to society at large, and the governance, there is a systemic approach that doesn't stop at apathy, it moves into malice and violence. The number of times she has to up and move from her house/job is a testament to that.
The book, though unwavering in its focus on the marginalised, is also a political and social commentary, bringing out the communal tensions that repeatedly affect Syeda's life and work, and highlighting the systematic execution of the Hindu rashtra plan by the BJP and its cousins.
Through all this, Syeda is relentlessly resilient, eking out a sense of agency and constantly adapting to everything thrown at her. But "from a chatterbox who loved films, music, colours, she became an irritable, bitter, quiet woman, who kept to herself." Her only support, beyond her daughter Reshma (which she never really acknowledges) is the community of those like her, bonded by the different oppressions and systemic injustices they face.
It is impossible not to feel for her, Akmal (husband), and Reshma. The former becomes a rickshaw puller after being a skilled weaver of high-end saris, and the former, who despite being a spirited 'Dilliwali' struggles with the burden of looking after her parents amidst her own aspirations. It is heartbreaking to see that a generation later, though Reshma's job at the mall is ostensibly better than Syeda's work, it is still dreadful.
The book isn't a happy one, and the usage of Bollywood lyrics and Urdu poetry accentuate the poignance. An interesting aspect is how relevant events across the spectrum - from the release of movies to the launch of Aadhaar to the Shaheen Bagh protests - are highlighted to show how they affect those like Syeda. A dogged and unflinching portrayal of lives at the intersection of gender, poverty, and religion, it is a brutal but necessary gut punch for the reader and the society we are part of.

Notes
1. तमाम रिश्तों को मैं घर पे छोड़ आया था
फिर उस के बा'द मुझे कोई अजनबी न मिला
- बशीर बद्र
2. In October 2018, Kerala became the first state to pass the 'Right to Sit' law that mandated shops to provide seating arrangements for all workers.
3. The kind of errors Aadhar has, especially in the documents of those who are supposed to gain from it is crazy! A combination of illiteracy, systemic apathy, and corruption (in the cost to get changes done)

[Shruti Santosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Many Lives of Syeda X is the story of a migrant Muslim woman whose life in Banaras is yanked from its root during the Babri masjid demolition. Syeda and her husband belonged to the skilled weaving community and were forced to settle into the life of poor migrants in Delhi after the police burnt their home and destroyed their looms.

This book is the story of Syeda who has done 50 jobs so far, working more than 16 hours a day, and is easily replaced when she falls sick and misses a few hours of work. She has packaged tubes of fair and love, made earrings, glued bindis to bindi packets, fitted cover brackets on the cookers, strewn marigold garlands, broken almonds shells. It’s the story of Syeda and also the story of many migrant workers. The book also braids images and stories of people Syeda encounters: other women struggling to make a living with piece-based work but finding comfort and strength in each other's company, children plastering their bread with Iodex to get a high and work with robotic efficiency, Delhi Police and their unlawful targeting of muslims to bury justice, especially Bihari muslims because no one would come looking for them, the HKRF's (Hindu Kanya Raskha front) “saving one Hindu girl is equal to saving 100 cows" message.

The book closes with Syeda's life uprooting again, one when work reduces or empties during demonetization and then during the Delhi riots in 2020 where her limited savings of 20,000 rupees, a pair of gold earrings, two pairs of silver anklets, her house, and her work were once again stolen.

It’s a must read book that brings us face-to-face with our country’s “growth story”. It is a portal for people like us living in our privileged bubbles. It also makes one ask:

- Whose life is yanked from riots instigated by power hungry, bigoted politicians?
- Who can be falsely charged of a crime and who has the support of their caste and religion?
- Who is consulted and who is snubbed when courts pass laws shutting down factories, causing people to lose jobs?
- Why do some of us receive benefits, paid leaves, stable 9-5 jobs, severance, and some are replaced when they miss a mere five hours of work?

[Tushar 582088 · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has been on future reading list and, to be honest, I was not sure I was ever going to get round to reading it. However, my daughter peeped into my reading list and decided to buy it for my birthday. Wow - what a read!
The story of an unremarkable family in Northern India, a story similar to many others, but to me absolutely extraordinary and compelling. The way the author narrates the life story of Syeda and her family is so clear, paced so perfectly, that it's a real page turner. The author's writing style is somewhat journalistic (which makes the book so readable) and yet the empathy she creates for all the main protagonists is very skilfully done in that you don't even realise how you are being drawn into their world. Its a tough world and one that anyone who hasn't experienced should be exposed to - how these "others" have to live and what they have to do to simply survive. She highlights the strengths and flaws in each of the characters as they go through their various episodes in their life in such a way that you feel you almost know them personally. You really want to know what happens to them next, even though you know their story is probably shared by millions of others in that part of India. I particularly liked how the author interleaved important political and social events into the story, which are so important in understanding how Syeda's life unfolds and is impacted by them. The references to Bollywood films throughout the book was also brilliantly done.
A highly recommended book for anyone who is interested in a real life contemporary story or the impact of contemporary politics/social events on ordinary people.

[♡ amina ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Listened to the audiobook and it had me sobbing inside. Heartbroken for the faceless silenced women of India . Our women deserve so much more: neha dixit did an excellent job at researching Syed’s life over many decades and and storytelling aspect

[Amit · Rating 5 out of 5]

India is a country of many paradoxes. For instance, India's "middle class" is richer than 90% of its population. India's labor laws cover a tiny percentage of India's labor. Possibly under 10%, even on paper. India is a "secular socialist" country where oligarchs own most of India's wealth (and politicians), and religion defines almost every aspect of human life.

So what happens when you don't fall in the 10% of "middle class" or above? What happens when you, in addition, happen to be the most hated religious minority: the Muslims? The story of Syeda X is the story of that "what". A labor of love, a painstaking narration of the stories of such "invisiblized" Indians, and what the crony-capitalist, religio-fascist nation-state does to them, this is an important book for all the privileged Indians to read. I know it will be wasted on most of them, but hey, maybe a few, who haven't completely been brainwashed by the system, may start seeing India from a different gaze, and to want to change it.

Neha Dixit is a freelance journalist specializing in socio-political reporting covering the "intersection of politics, gender, and social issues" (from her LinkedIn bio), and she brings in that unfaltering journalistic gaze to see what most of us privileged don't want to see. And she has put in years, interviewing tens of people, to give us a glimpse of India many of us will not be able to survive in, and yet the only thing that keeps us out of it is, for most, the privilege of birth in a specific cross-section of religion/caste and class.

The book chronicles the life of Syeda (name changed), a Muslim woman from Banaras, and her family, displaced from their hometown due to religious strife (read persecution of the RSS parivar), made to scrape a livelihood against all odds, in the unorganized industrial wasteland of Delhi and its neighboring urban/semi-urban sprawls.

It's a story of grit but not of redemption, because redemption is not affordable to many thanks to their location in life, it's meant for the privileged and their banal fairytales. Instead, we get a story of survival through a dogged refusal to be defeated, by every odd. It's a story of the ugly face of India's politics and socio-political milieu, that destroys lives many times over, to force people to pick up the pieces and start again, and again, as religion is weaponized, the merciless forces of crony crony-capitalism are left unchecked, and the patriarchy feeds, and is in turn fed, by the unholy mix of religion, politics, and parochialism.

What sets Neha's book apart is that while she tells this story, she manages to curb the urge to be preachy, but doesn't shy away from contextualizing her stories through a matter-of-fact, concise yet powerful commentary, and through data points that bolster that commentary.

I cannot recommend it enough ...

[Mridul Gharia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Many Lives of Syeda X by Neha Dixit

In the Author’s note, Neha writes that she worked on the book for almost 9 years and that in 2020, in the aftermath of Delhi riots (led by hate speeches, CAA protests and ‘religious nationalism’- read on Wikipedia to refresh your memory) as her visits to Karawal Nagar (located in North East part of Delhi) increased, she was stalked for over five months and received acid attacks and gang rape threats for her reporting. She was warned to stop reporting on the riots and Hindu supremacist organisations. The police did not conduct any investigation and told her that she was imagining it.

Have you heard of Karawal Nagar? I lived in Delhi for 24 years and yet I havent. It is home to tons of home based workers who work at less than minimum wages for per dozens kind of paltry wage structure; home to the informal unorganised sector where making ends meet means taking on multiple work until you can barely survive. As I write this and google Karawal Nagar, a News article from Hindu dated March 27, 2024 pops up which says that nearly 4000 workers at almond processing units of Karawal Nagar ended their 24 day strike for a hike in daily wages after the factory owners agreed to their demands. Can you guess the hike? Workers will now be paid Rs3 per kg for sifting almonds instead of Rs2 per kg and wages of those working in packaging units were increased from Rs5 per kg to Rs6 per kg. With the retail price of one kg almonds easly over Rs 500, this seems like a joke, right?

What does it mean to be living life at the periphery? Most of us cannot make a proper commentary on it since we have never experienced it. Neha tries to provide an insight on those living at the margin through Syeda and her family as they navigate various political, economic, social and religious targetting in the form of propaganda, hate speeches and riots, leading to eventual uprooting and displacing of Syeda and her family from Banaras to Delhi- thrown from being the prominent respected weaving community of Banaras to the dungeon of the informal unorganised economy blooming in the outskirts of Delhi.

The riots preceding and after Babri Masjid demolition, demonetisation, perceived ‘love-Jihad’, Shaheen Bagh protests on CAA-NRC, Delhi riots of 2020, amongst others, are the central ways which impacted the life of the protagonist- Syeda, an Indian Muslim woman. We were taught in school that India is diverse with a unique mix of culture and communities where people coexist in peace and harmony. It was a lie to some extent. We love questioning the identity of those around us, a few more than others. An identity that is imposed upon us the day we are born and something we cannot shrug ourselves of. Though the years 1992 and 2020 are 28 years apart, but sadly, the riots in both the years were fuelled by the same hate and propaganda of ‘Hindu khatre me hai’ and ‘ghuspaithiye’ nonsense. We love to discriminate. We love to exclude. We are jealous of the progress made by those at the periphery and can’t stand their growth specially financially and socially. We want to be superior, always.

Syeda’s family moved from Banaras to Delhi in the hope that the same communal orthodoxy which plagues a smaller city wouldn’t be prominent in the capital city. But what did she know. Probably the byproduct of being born as a minority in our country is fear. And hate. And it is easy for me to call it out because I happen to be in the religious majority.

Her plight and struggle as the primary breadwinner of the family is what we see for most of the book- taking on multiple jobs within a day, short on sleep, being replaced by someone if you are late for work or down with an illness, home based work hardly making any money and being paid significantly less than the minimum wage, making her daughter skip school to help with the work while the sons attend school, lack of community- all this while barely surviving. Probably the only relief she feels and looks forward to comes much later in the book where just like her, several women develop a camraderie at ‘Radiowali’s place- a single independent woman with many lovers and later when the women working in the almond factories organised a strike to challenge the wages, constant abuse faced and horrid work conditions (no toilets, dingy lights etc)- these are the only times when Syeda and a few other women in the book feel a sense of agency and control over their lives.

Syeda’s husband, Akmal, is an alcoholic and is the notable example set for her children as to how not to end in their lives. He is a cart puller and when he is not working which is pretty much most of the book, he takes refuge in alcohol. How typical! There is no mention of him abusing the children or Syeda under the pretext of alcohol which is such a relief.

Also, somewhere in the book where the key members of the Gau rakshak groups are getting aggressive about protecting cows and women, someone says that ‘saving one woman is the same as saving 100 cows’. Some really ‘wise’ man came up with this equivalence and might I dare say, what an idiot. The only saving that women require is from high on testosterone and crap consuming men like these with the kurtas and Tilaks being flaunted on their forehead, eyes screening women and deciding what they wear and how they behave that is appropriate for a woman from a respectable family. One of my many desires in life is creation of women safety groups comprising solely of women giving such men a taste of their own medicine - the men women suspect of abusing them, men who are constantly stalking and monitoring them, men who police them and act as their owners. How dreamy!

Syeda’s elder son, Shazeb, elopes with a Hindu girl, Babli and obviously it is ‘love jihad’ and obviously it is a nightmare for Syeda’s family and obviously the two consenting adults don’t return back to their homes for the fear of their lives. The book also tracks the journey of Reshma, Syeda’s youngest child and her daughter who ends up being the primary breadwinner of the family later in the book but Syeda refuses to recognise and acknowledge Reshma’a contribution to the family- almost ironic since this is exactly what Syeda use to complain about early in the book of not really belonging in her house and not getting an ounce of affection from her family. And this is exactly what she subjects her daughter to. We always feel that our generation is better than the previous one but maybe not.

While reading the Mint today, I came across a quote by Benjamin Franklin that “justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.”. Maybe kalyug is here after all, naash vinaash sab yahin hoga and all of us will watch until someone comes for us.

A reality of India that most of us have never experienced- I strongly suggest this book.

[maydha · Rating 5 out of 5]

everytime i think i loathe hindutva people enough its not enough. india is an islamophobic country that will never be great, just as america never will be because its majoritarian ideologies are structurally set on killing poor people and immigrants. what a heart breaker, especially after this election in america.

[Parvathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Syeda, born to a weaving family in Banares, moves to Delhi with her husband and kids following the riots of 1992. She is one of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who move into Delhi every year, from villages and small towns across India. Neha Dixit follows Syeda's story from the early 90s to the present day. It is a story that can seem extraordinary if not for the fact that it is actually quite ordinary, in our country of more than a billion people.
Syeda is a woman, poor and Muslim - that perfect mix of gender, class and religion that can make life difficult for an Indian. To make ends meet, Syeda starts juggling jobs, and over the course of three decades, she estimates she must have done fifty different jobs - trimming threads in jeans and footballs, making rakhis and door hinges, shelling almonds, all of this mostly at home. As part of the invisible workforce of women in this country working in the informal sector, she earns a pittance (Rs. 50 for cleaning a 23 kilo bag of almonds), works 12 to 16 hours a day, with no paid leave (she loses jobs because she has missed work for a day) and zero benefits. There is much she learns to deal with - earning a daily wage, unscrupulous employers and landlords, bringing up her kids only to lose them (to an accident, to love jihad) to negotiating the growing communal tension around her. Life beats her down, she gets up and starts over, and gets beaten down again, until she is a far cry from the carefree girl singing Ek Do Teen in Banaras a lifetime ago.
We see ground-up, the reality of sweatshops that manufacture the daily things we take so much for granted - tea strainers and dolls and clothes and namkeen. We see all the things that make life dangerous for Syeda and her family - communalism, COVID and the accompanying lockdown, demonetization. We see how all the laws and programs successive governments have enacted to make the lives of Indian citizens better are far from succeeding at that last mile.
Dixit interviews more than 900 people over a span of a decade to make this book come alive. Syeda is a real individual says she, and not a composite. It makes her story all the more chilling.
This one is a must-read for all of us right-minded Indians. There is much to do in this country of ours, and miles to go before we can rest. The Syedas of our country deserve better.

[Richa Verma · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had the pleasure of studying with Neha Dixit during our course of Bachelor of Education in English Literature @ Miranda House, Delhi University, from 2003-06. She had the proclivity to write for the college magazine and others from that time itself. Over the past 1.5 decades she has become an outstanding freelance investigative journalist with many awards like Chameli Devi Jain Award for Outstanding Woman, the 2014 Kurt Schork in International Journalism and others under her belt.

The Many Lives of Sayeda X is her first venture into novel writing and demonstrates her meticulous attention to detail while conducting research for her book, whether it is interviewing the victims, visiting the police stations, diving into the tomes in libraries or empathetic counseling of those she interviewed.

Through Sayeda X, who can represent any anonymous Muslim woman of the lowest social and economic wrung of Indian society, she peels the layers of veneer to lay threadbare the underbelly of our so called 'civil' society which is majoritarian, orthodox and elitist.

Sayeda is triply marginalized because (a) she is a woman, (b) she is a Muslim and (c) she works in the unorganised sector of the Indian economy with no rights or job security. She hops from one home based work to another, changing 40 odd jobs just in order to live from hand to mouth. In fact, the titles of the book are the names of the jobs. There is gender based discrimination in payment of wages which are far below the minimum wage guaranteed by the Indian government. Her precarious situation is heightened by Islamophobia which kills one of her sons and takes away another as he elopes with a woman of another religion.

The book touches upon 3 decades of socio-political and economic policies of the Indian government right from the demolition of the Babri Masjid (which displaced Sayeda from Benaras and her ancestral weaving profession) to the introduction of the Adhar card. Just when things start looking up economically for Sayeda, some legal or political or economic move of the government nips her hopes in the bud. Dixit leaves no stone unturned to showcase the genocide faced by the minorities in the country.

This book is not for the faint hearted because it hits you in the belly and shakes you to think about and question various ideologies and dogma prevalent in our country .

[Preethi Krishnan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have always enjoyed Neha Dixit's journalistic pieces and this book only confirmed my liking of her words. In a context where gender justice or Islamophobia is often evaluated in isolation, this book does something amazingly powerful. She shows how the life of a migrant Muslim woman from Banaras in Delhi has been influenced by the right wing movement in India's governance both in terms of Hindutva politics and anti labour policies over the last few decades. The demolition of Babri Masjid, the lynching of Muslims in the name of cow protection, the issues with demonetisation, CAA, Aadhar all makes its way into Syeda's life. That gender justice includes workers rights is central to this book, and for that I am grateful. I also loved the part where the author describes Banaras as a place where Hindus and Muslims coexisted especially in artistic realms. I read some criticism of the book that the middle class gaze creates a helpless victim of Syeda. Indeed Syeda's life is difficult, her losses that Neha documents made me tear up multiple times, but that's not all that the book is about. There are characters all over who struggle and seek out joy and influence others to do the same. The character and home of Nisha Radiowali is my favourite. Her home seemed to be a heaven on earth for all the working Migrant women. There was love and care and laughter. Most importantly, from that space, that seemed radical simply for offering emotional comfort to the women, also rose the seeds of the successful almond workers strike. Even as a lot of their life is difficult, those few pages on the strike, captured the excitement and courage these women demonstrate. That space also gave access to activists who were called upon every time Syeda's children were harassed by the police, which was often. Then there was Reshma, yet another favourite character of mine, her love for GG, and his care for her, a woman who had been toughened by life at a very young age. In many ways, I loved that about the book, that no character felt like a stereotype - all capable of love and care when life gave them a chance. Don't miss it. Highly recommended.

[Angshuman Maity · Rating 4 out of 5]

Can a nation like India truly celebrate itself while ignoring the contributions of its home-based workers and marginalizing its minority communities? In “The Many Lives of Syeda X: The Story of an Unknown Indian”, Neha Dixit confronts us with the uncomfortable truth that human values remain disturbingly low in our society. For home-based workers, survival itself is precarious — and when religious identity enters the equation, the burden often multiplies many times over.

The story begins in Banaras and unfolds largely in Delhi, tracing the journey of Syeda. Through the struggles of migrant labourers, the book examines communal disharmony, labour exploitation, and deep-rooted inequality in India, especially in the National Capital Region. At its core, this is a story about the relentless hardships faced by home-based workers, mostly women, and how religious toxicity can threaten even their fragile survival.

What makes the book compelling is its seamless blending of reportage and narrative. At times, however, the storytelling feels slightly inconsistent — for instance, Reshma was mentioned as being replaced at her job at the mall, but later said to have quit. Such moments however do not jar the powerful narrative.

One particularly moving episode is when GG decides to give up his savings — meant for building a family home after two decades of struggle — to help Reshma and her family during the lockdown. It captures the essence of the book: that collective human effort, even amid despair, can carve out hope and dignity.

Ultimately, this is not just the story of Syeda or any single worker — it is a mirror held up to Indian society. The book leaves us with a haunting question: Is the political pursuit of a “Hindu Rashtra” more important than securing a safe and dignified life for our workers and fellow citizens? For liberals, engaged citizens, and lovers of social commentary, this is essential reading.

[Shefali Tripathi Mehta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I felt numb after reading this book. The details of the events since 2014 are very unsettling. All of us know some but need to know and acknowledge a lot more. Like other reviewers here, I also think that everyone should read this comprehensively researched chronicle of our times. Ramchandra Guha has called the author 'extremely courageous' and I marvelled at her courage throughout the book, and many times more when I read about how she has been constantly threatened.

This work exemplifies true journalism, presenting events as they unfolded without assigning blame, thereby allowing readers to form their own judgments based on their moral perspectives. The narrative is compelling and unputdownable. The intensity with which it hits one is again subjective, depending on what ones 'idea of India' is.

It lays bare not just communal fissures, but that of class in all its raw, painful reality. The next time one looks at almonds, bindis, or Diwali torans, one will be forced to remember the pittance those who put these together for us in shining cellophane get.

The cruellest thing to happen to humans is for their spirit to be crushed by being denied opportunities - to study, to earn an honest living. It is not even about achieving equality with others; it is about being allowed any opportunity at all - just a chance, sometimes just the chance to prove themselves innocent when 'rounded up' merely because they belong to a particular religion and are poor.

[Sherry · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd start my review by saying that it takes a lot of courage, honesty and grit to write a book like this and that too in a time like today. I'm in awe of the author where she gave 9 years of her life to make this book happen. Truly said, it is a story of an unknown Indian and many more like her. It's a gripping narrative which will take you on a rollercoaster ride only to witness the other India amongst The Two India we live in. It's evocative, profound and brilliantly put. The book is written with meticulous precision and is a testament to how a life of an ordinary citizen is moulded as per the changing times and geopolitics. The sequence of events is so accurate that while reading it i didn't stray even once or get confused about the events taking place.

Syeda represents every woman who once had been a victim of communal discord, poverty and many other issues pertaining to women, who belongs to a marginalized society. Syeda who was married at the age of 16 had to change jobs just to make ends meet. She once belonged to the weaver class when she lived in benaras but soon after as the tension escalated due to the demolition of Babri mosque she along with her husband Akmal and kids had to leave benaras and resettle in Delhi. She changed around 50 jobs in her thirty years in Delhi. She gave her all yet she lost everything in the process. It's also an eye-opener for those who are not woke enough but those who know, know.

PS: IT'S A MUST READ.

[Maya · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25

took me a while to get into it icl. idk if it was just bc i was in a reading slump or bc there was a lot of new info. like at times the book moved very fast and i was struggling to keep up/wrap my head around some things. it did explain many concepts pretty well but bc i not that familiar w indian society & history, it took me a bit to get whats happening.

idk like i knew shit was fucked in india but i didnt realize to what level and just looking at the experiences of a handful of people and knowing that this is what they went through is horrifying.

it was especially interesting to read of the propaganda used by the BJP & the hindutva ideology bc so much of it is actually outrageous but it still manages to work! and thats the thing about propaganda, even if its nonsensical or farfetched it can still work. the world we live in is absolutely dystopian.

i do want to read more about the caste system. like this book showed its day-to-day effect on people's lives but i do want to learn more about it. ig its a bit difficult to conceptualize bc its a diff form of discrimination that i havent witnessed

[Shruti · Rating 3 out of 5]

an urgent, necessary read. Neha Dixit traces the story of modern North India through the eyes of a working-class Muslim woman, bookended by two communal pogroms in Banaras and Delhi, and this book shows us the everyday negotiations that people engage in to make a life and a living. it is a vital documentation of our time and I think it does paint a portrait of the lives that many elite, English-speaking Indians are unaware of or choose to not see. that said, I think the book struggled with structure and pacing, and could have benefited from stronger editorial support. important characters felt one-dimensional, significant events were passed over too quickly, and although the material is rich and deep, it often did not rise above the details of everyday life to demonstrate the significance of an observation. though it was granular in its narration of events, as a whole, the book lacked an emotional (a literary!) register that it so easily could have struck.

[Tautik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Neha's book offers a poignant exploration of the invisible workforce that sustains India's economy. Syeda, a migrant Muslim woman, embodies the struggles of the 80% of the Indian workforce who toil in the informal sector, often for exploitative wages.
Across 30 years, from the Babri Masjid demolition riots to the 2020 Delhi riots, Syeda's journey mirrors India's tumultuous political landscape. Her story is one of resilience, as she navigates the intersections of class, religion, and gender while working in the unorganized sector.
Neha's decade-long research uncovers the harsh truths experienced by workers like Syeda. The book underscores the empathy required to understand the lives of those who stitch our jeans, craft our tea strainers, and manufacture the countless items that enrich our daily lives.
It is the story of Delhi ki behudi.

[Apoo · Rating 5 out of 5]

as a social scientist who’s studied cities and city building, housing shortages, home based work, lack of delivery of services, the increasing malevolence of a Hindutva state are familiar topics. but to read them as milestones and mundane occurrences in a single individual’s life made me ache and made me uncomfortable in extremely necessary ways. thank you to Neha Dixit for amplifying Syeda’s story.

there’s much to take away from here — how skills are devalued and livelihoods destroyed, how romance and love are undermined, how labor is extracted but also rejected… and how everything swells and intensifies under Hindutva. this kind of rich, longitudinal ethnographic work is so necessary to evidence social and economic problems that the Hindutva state subjects India’s Muslims to, woven together at great personal risk to the Syeda, her family and the author herself.

[Sujai · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed reading this book as it takes us through the life of a muslim woman, born in Banaras to a family of weavers.
She had to migrate from her home town due to the riots after the demolishment of Babri Masjit in 1992.
The family moves to Delhi .Here , Syeda navigates her life taking up as many as 50 different jobs.
Through he life, the author touches upon the struggles the poor, especially the minorty face in India.

Simple incidents that show the divide in our society along cast and religion. And then there are instances / rays of hope and stories of good samaritans that keep the world around us running.

I liked the narrative style of the author. I also liked how she highlights significant events of India that happen over the course of the life of Syeda.

Highly recommend this for anyone interested to know the lives of poor in India.

[Priya · Rating 5 out of 5]

A novel plus history plus news story, Neha Dixit's masterful story about Syeda X, a migrant working woman from Banaras, in Dilli, reminds me of home, in uncomfortable, stark, contrarian ways. Each chapter is named after something that Syeda makes and sells throughout her life: from raisins to doorknobs. In the Introduction, the author, a journalist, tells us that this single story captures all the lives of ordinary women that don't make it to primetime news channels in India. It's about neoliberalism and the working class. As I read this book, I wondered how often I have crossed paths with Syeda X in my urban gullies, and how different my India was from countless others'. I found her style to be equally transparent, wry, painful on every page.

[Gurpreet Singh · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Story of an Unknown Indian
THE MANY LIVES OF SYEDA X (2024) Neha Dixit
One of the best reads of 2024, it tells the story of Syeda, a migrant laborer in Delhi, whose life comes full circle, only to end back where it started. Her journey parallels India’s own story over the last 30 years. This nonfiction book, centered around the life story of its protagonist, makes it very interesting. This book is a portal to a harsh world hidden away from elite Indians. It is the story of untold millions and a searing account of urban life.
Highly recommended for the radicalized Gen Z of our times!

[M · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this book in Delhi and am so glad I did. This is a truly exceptional work of journalism, staggering in both its scope and focused attention on the specific details of one woman’s life. I learned so much from this book - highly recommended reading for anyone interested in contemporary India.

[Princy Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

A deeply realistic portrayal of the life of a Muslim migrant woman in northeast Delhi, told against the backdrop of major events in independent India. The narrative powerfully illustrates how gender, class, religion, and caste intersect to shape everyday life in urban India. A vital read for anyone working in the development space or seeking to understand the lived experiences behind policy and politics.

[Lakshmi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hope to write something concrete about this eventually because it's so well-researched, takes an uncompromising but empathetic approach to describing the harsh realities that working-class Muslim women face in today's India. Such an important, timely work.

[R MANOJ KUMAR SINGHVI · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly unputdownable, page turner. A very rare kind of book which is objective. Well researched and insightful. It will walk you through a life of average citizen especially a migrant Delhite . Their resilience and fortitude in facing the challenges . A must read

[Shradha]

Very beautifully written and well articulated.