Plight of a maid who was beaten everyday for eight months until she couldn't walk.

Thousands of domestic helpers took to the streets of Hong Kong yesterday to demand justice for an Indonesian maid who was allegedly enslaved and tortured by her employers for eight months.

Erwiana Sulistyaningsih, 22, was reportedly left unable to walk following eight months of abuse in the southern Chinese city and was admitted to an Indonesian hospital in critical condition last week after returning home.

 Erwiana Sulistyaningsih, 22, was left unable to walk following eight months of abuse at the hands of her employers

Details of her torture has sparked widespread anger across Hong Kong, and yesterday a second Indonesian domestic helper came forward to claim that she had suffered similar beatings and death threats at the hands of the same employers in 2010.

Made to sleep on the floor, Erwiana said she worked 21-hour shifts, had no days off, was fed just a single bowl of rice a day and was beaten constantly, sometimes for no apparent reason at all.

Finally, when her injuries had become so severe that she could no longer work, her boss bought her a ticket home, gave her 70 Hong Kong dollars (£5.50) and dumped her at Honk Kong airport, making her swear never to mention what had happened to her.

'She told me that she knew a lot of people in Indonesia and if I said anything she would have my parents killed,' Erwiana told Al Jazeera, surrounded by her family in a hospital bed in Sragen, Central Java.

 Erwiana said her employer beat her on a daily basis with a lot of different implements, usually with the handle of her mop, mostly on her head

Healing: Doctors at Amel Sehat Islamic Hospital said she is suffering from swelling of the brain from repeated blows to the head and her feet are brown and swollen with cellulitis - an infection of the skin that resulted from her long-untreated wounds