Garbage collection is easy, the commuting to work site is not

Pius Mathai rows a country boat, cycles for 2.5 hours to reach Elamakkara where he collects garbage from 100-odd houses

Pius Mathai, a 47-year-old from Chellanam, can barely stand when he returns home from work around noon every second day in a week. Dazed, he takes a shower and is almost asleep even before hitting the bed. Having skipped lunch out of exhaustion, he wakes up hungry late in the evening. Even before the pandemic and the lockdowns, life was not very kind to Pius. For almost two years now, his nights are spend collecting waste from over a hundred households in Elamakkara.