“Should we eat mud or stones here in the city? Should we remain in the city to avoid corona that may kill us, to be surely killed by hunger? It is better that we go back to our villages. At least there we will get to eat roti with salt,” says a migrant worker.

It takes a pandemic to make the magnitude of a problem clear. Thousands of people's images, the poorest of the poor in India, on social media and televisions going on the long walk home often hundreds of kilometers, with children in tow, without food, without their destination in the sight and challenges galore on their journey back home; or waiting in long lines to board buses in Delhi, Jaipur, and other cities; or even the death of a 39-year-old migrant on his way home after walking 200 km from Delhi to Agra are some of the faces of profound inequality that COVID-19 made visible.

Within two-three days of lockdown problem of migrant laborers have surfaced. Most of the daily wagers, with no savings, work every day, to earn barely to fill their stomachs and then get ready again the next day to arrange food. A day's wage loss often means forced skipped meals. This is the reality of 21st-century Indian first-generation migrants. Images on social media platforms and TV channels show their plight. Despite a lot of hue and cry by the media and civil society, most of the state governments have not yet announced any plans or even helpline numbers to solve their problems. The same people, who helped build the cities, are now stranded in the same cities. It shows the insensitivity of the government towards migrant workers.

The severity of the situation

The census data of 2011 reflects that the four states - Uttar Pradesh (UP), Bihar, Rajasthan, and Madhya Pradesh -account for 50 percent of India's total inter-state migrants. More than 7.6 million laborers from UP and Bihar, who work mostly in the informal sector, do not figure in any ‘destination governments’ records as they are not registered.

In fact, there is no mechanism to register short-term migrants, as the states follow the policy of exclusive residence of six months for registering for PDS or voter ID card, and extends benefits to only these registered persons, thus excluding almost the entire migrant community.

Most of the migrant workers do not stay at one location for a long time as their nature of employment is seasonal and transitory, therefore, they don't register themselves in the area they live in and don't have voting rights in local councils and state elections. Thus undeniably they don’t get much needed local and political support. No one talks about their rights and conditions as they are not the ‘vote banks’ there. This is the main reason many state governments are escaping from their responsibility although enriching themselves of their most valuable labor.

Most migrant workers live in very poor conditions in slums. One room (10ft x 10ft) is usually shared by 5 to 10 people and they work in shifts to use the limited space. Many migrants’ workers from Hindi speaking states (UP, Rajasthan, and Bihar, etc), who work in south India face another set of challenges as language becomes a huge barrier and they are not able to communicate their problems to locals and police there.

Are government steps adequate?

The government knew that in India there are crores of migrant laborers living at just basic subsistence level and the problem can aggravate. But no plan was chalked out centrally. The government almost walked away by shifting the burden on state governments. The Gareeb Kalyan Yojana of Rs 1.7 lakh crore in itself will not solve the current problem. The Yojana with its obsession with documents skipped the migrant issues altogether. Take for instance free PDS for three months (only cardholders); free LPG for three months (only for document-based connections); 24% PF contribution (for semi-formal employment); thus effectively and precisely excluding every migrant. The central government has advised state governments to utilize the existing construction welfare fund to provide benefits for construction workers but no clear directive has been issued about how state governments will utilize the funds. Moreover, almost none of the construction workers have registered anywhere. There are many layers of contractors, sub-contractors, labor agents, thus reaching ground workers will be a documentation nightmare (mind you documents again).

As expected, as of now, not a single state has taken any step to utilize this fund. Community kitchens, like initiative by Delhi and Kerala government, can solve this issue up to some extent.

Another remarkable decision has been taken by Noida and Lucknow administration where laborers have got an exemption from rent but it’s a bit late and most of the laborers don’t have written rent agreements, this may result in leakages and benefits may not reach the intended laborers. 

What next?

To win against the deadly corona, collective action from public administration and civil society is required to ensure the fulfillment of the basic needs of migrant workers. Few things can be considered in dealing with the situation in the short and long run.

*To ensure the complete lockdown, it is required to provide urgent assistance to laborers at the place of their work/residence.

*It is critical to providing food to all migrant workers irrespective of their registration. The government can think of turning government schools, panchayat bhawan’s, bus stations, stadiums, etc into temporary shelter homes and community kitchens. As per the press release of the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution on February 7, 2020, 565.11 lakh metric tons of food grains are available in godowns of Food Corporation of India and Central Warehousing Corporation. So, till the corona pandemic continues, the government should think of implementing Universal Food Rationing by opening its PDS for all by accepting Aadhar card (almost all labors possess) as identification proof.

*State governments should partner with NGO’s and volunteers to reach them.

*Due to job loss, many workers are left with no money, hence asking their family members for help (reverse remittances). It is quite evident that most of them have agricultural backgrounds and the head of the family are registered in PM Kisan Nidhi scheme and has Jan Dhan accounts. So, the government can provide more money to marginal and poor farmers, if not all farmers, so that wage loss of migrant workers can get compensated indirectly.

In the long run, central government with the help of state governments must work out mechanisms to register all the migrant labors, especially the short term and vulnerable ones and the list should be revised periodically.

Another side of pandemics and so-called not ‘pandemics’

People get emotional when they hear about the death of 34,000 people globally due to deadly corona. But what about lakhs of deaths due to malnutrition (six lakh children die a year in India, UNICEF), TB (four lakh people dies a year in India, WHO), pneumonia, diarrhea, and malaria, which has become part and parcel of marginalized’s life.

But who cares, no media house organizes debates, no WHO advisories, no celebrity donations, no city lockdown, for these so-called not 'pandemics', which are easily preventable by vaccination and proper nutrition, and are even curable.

We fear corona will become another TB for which the rich will get the vaccination, and the diseases will not get the same government and medical community. But it will be the marginalized workers that will continue to die as is happening in the case of TB, Malaria and many other neglected tropical diseases.

We hope that this pandemic ignites the debate for the welfare of ‘marginalized push migrants’. Hope Indian cities respect the city builders, and migrants get the political voice in city governance. Hope India ‘the land of persecuted refugees’ becomes fairer to its own migrants.

(Suresh Kumar Patel is an accounts officer at MP Markfed, Madhya Pradesh government.  Abhishek Kumar is a research scholar, marketing, at Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology, Amethi, UP  and Noorul Quamer is a deputy manager at Axis Bank)