Sri Lanka's plantation workers live on the margins, but politicians want their votes

A woman tea plantation worker plucks tea leaves at an estate in Badulla, Sri Lanka, Tuesday, Sept. 10, 2024. Tea plantation worker Adaraja Ali Rani leaves her living quarters to pluck tea tips in Spring Valley estate in Badulla, Sri Lanka, Sep. 10, 2024. Muthuthewarkittan Manohari, a tea plantation worker, right, bathes her younger daughter Madubhashini, as her elder daughter Shalani, center, stands at the doorway of their small house in Spring Valley Estate in Badulla, Sri Lanka, Sept. 9, 2024.

Whoever Sri Lanka's next president is, Muthuthevarkittan Manohari isn't expecting much to change in her daily struggle to feed the four children and elderly mother with whom she lives in a dilapidated room in a tea plantation.