India's Migrant Workers - A Hostage ?

Should we blame Covid-19 for India's Migrant Workers Hostage ?

Point to be noted is that almost 64% of migrant workers have less than Rs 100 left, and 78% have not been paid since lockdown. They surely want to go back to their home, but is their path blocked by the government ?

It seems our response to this Covid plight of the migrant worker brings out all that is rotten in today’s India: obscene class inequalities, loss of society’s moral compass, paralysis of politics, and toxic media. Looking at our response, future generations would wonder if we were reacting to some humanitarian crisis in far-away Nigeria.

Equality, liberty and dignity for all. This is meant to define the modern social contract. But India’s lockdown seems to have deprived migrant workers of all three elements.

The lockdown began with the government pretending that migrant workers did not exist. There was not a word about them in the government’s original guidelines.They were noticed only when lakhs of them voted with their feet and started walking hundreds of kilometres.

Facts Speak Themselves

Even this did not lead to any coherent policy response. The problem was managed by dispersing the crowds visible to cameras. Some of them were packed into buses, others were shoved into makeshift relief camps. Some strict orders were issued not to allow anyone to travel anymore. They did not stop. Thousands, possibly lakhs, still continued to walk back, or cycle, or hitch-hike. Eventually they were not the TV headlines anymore. They did not matter. The Karnataka government’s attitude towards them would suggest that even slavery is no longer a thing of the past. The state had requisitioned trains to take migrants back home, but then abruptly decided to cancel them on the argument that it would fall short of labour were they to leave, as reported. For people who have had to scramble for food, hunt high and low for shelter and struggle for scraps of other necessities, this has been a severe blow.

Lets hope that the package announced by the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has something to cheer for these migrant workers.

Something to make out from this situation

The future generation might write this story of moral cussedness and political apathy where the state was inventing ways to keep workers hostage, where the opposition was busy in one-upmanship and when there was bizarre spin and disinformation to wriggle out the odds. Facts of the case were so straightforward that you would have to make an effort to get confused. Now, lets hope this black tunnel of world pandemic itself finds some light soon.

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