LOCKED AWAY FROM THEIR HOMES: THE LOCKDOWN STORIES OF MIGRANT WORKERS
The Author of this blog is Ms. Jayada Tripathi,
INTRODUCTION
The outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19 disease) has placed everyone under duress and
has forced governments across the globe to impose lockdowns in the effort to
curb the transmission rate of the hazardous virus. Albeit ‘Social Distancing’
has become the new cornerstone and Lockdown is the need of the hour, yet a question raised is whether the imposition of 21-days PAN India lockdown and the subsequent extension of the same was a well-planned and well-executed move?
In
the post sundown hours of 24 March 2020, the Prime Minister, thorough a public broadcast
had announced that a nationwide lockdown shall be imposed for 21 days, starting
the very next day. This sent the general public into a frenzy, although the
call taken by the Government was an anticipated one. With the effective notice
period being less than even five hours, people lined up in front of shops to
hoard essentials while others working in cities away from home tried to reach
home as soon as possible.
However,
the elephantine problem that surfaced was that of the exodus of Migrant Workers
who flocked in thousands at railway stations and bus stations, desperate to
reach their native villages.
There
were reports of Anand Vihar bus terminus on the Delhi-U.P. border being
thronged by migrant workers who made a wretched
attempt to escape the ‘Big City’ that used to be the source of their income in
the pre-COVID-19 world, but were halted by police barricades. On March 29, they
made yet another attempt to escape the city; tired-hungry-jobless-and homesick,
the rules of Social Distancing were clearly not the foremost thing on their mind.
The problem of the huge influx of migrants from small towns, cities, and villages into
the metro cities had been colossal as it is and this recent crisis of their
being locked away from their homes is only a small branch of the huge tree that
had been comfortably ignored by most until now. The Economic Survey 2017 put
the estimated number of labor migrations between the states at nine million. For those at the bottom of
the pyramid, life back at home is substandard and with many mouths to feed and
little or no scope of income there, they do what seems to be the only getaway;
they migrate. In the ‘Big Cities’ most of them work as daily-wages laborers at
construction sites, drivers, gardeners, domestic helpers, street vendors, in malls,
in textile industries, etc.
With
prospects becoming hazy, jobs out of their hands, and the Lockdown looming
overhead as a result of the COVID-19 crisis, all they wanted was to return
home. Their determination was tested when they had to walk home in the event of a lack of transport. Some even crossed state borders to reach their home state as
India witnessed what was probably the greatest exodus since the partition. The
highways of the country became a miserable sight as millions of laborers
walked day and night to reach their destination. All this while battling hunger,
fatigue, and harsh rebukes and occasional beating from the police in addition to
the gigantic distance.
Several
people died in the process as well, for example, a twelve-year-old girl who had
to walk from Telangana to Chhattisgarh for three days before she collapsed, 14
km away from home. Those who could not migrate resorted to setting up their shelter on the deserted
roadside, under flyovers and bridges, and had to spend days in deplorable
conditions. Set aside the present need for sanitation and social distancing,
their living conditions were downright subhuman and could be assessed from the
sight near the banks of the Yamuna river in Delhi after thousands of migrant
workers were rescued by the authorities. They had lived under the Yamuna bridge
for days and the place resembled a garbage dump-site while the river itself was
reduced to sewage.
Accumulated from various similar sources, they
were taken to the assemblage of Government Health Shelters set up at various
places. Some were “tricked” into these camps, to use their vocabulary, when
they asked the police to help them arrange a transport to go back home. However,
they wanted to transport back home as soon as possible. The knowledge that
such relief programs cannot be for their entire lives and the worry that their
family left behind at home would be need of the scanty savings that they
carried with them made them more than desperate to reach home. Also, the
conditions in these health camps were not always perfect. There was a wave of
fear among the migrant laborers after a few instances of rapes being allegedly
committed in Government isolation wards and health camps surfaced.
On
14 April 2020 just hours after the Lockdown was extended till May 3, thousands
of migrant workers were seen to have gathered near the railway stations at
Mumbai, the financial capital of India. The industrial city of Surat witnessed a huge protest by the migrant workers of the
textile industries demanding to be transported home. These ignorant migrant
workers have proved to be susceptible to fall prey to rumors such as that of restarting
of train and bus services, and gullible enough to protest against the
Government authorities at the least ignition. With the task of implementing the
Lockdown and maintaining Social Distancing among the people at hand, the police
are reported to have acted stringently with the chaotic migrant laborers. There
are reports of migrant workers trying to flee from quarantine while others getting
uncontrollable while being liberally sprayed with disinfectants.
This
pandemic has forced Governments across the globe to resort to the most
desperate means but does it permit the Government of the Largest Democracy to
use methods bordering on assault to combat this situation? Authorities have
claimed that the Lockdown was the only remedy to the present crisis, and
rightly so, but the way in which it has been carried out is far from
acceptable. The lack of foresight and dexterity is evident from the situation
of the migrant workers. Many voices of opposition party members, lawyers,
activists, social workers, etc. have risen in criticism of the ill-planned
Lockdown. The PIL filed by lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan was dealt with by the
Supreme Court where it declared itself ‘not an expert body’ to deal with the
health and sanitation issues of the migrant workers. The petition filed had
said that; "Those who test negative for Covid-19 must not be forcibly kept
in shelters or away from their homes and families against their wishes. The
government should allow for their safe travel to their hometowns and villages
and provide necessary transportation for the same."
CONCLUSION
After
the dust settles and the situation starts to tread towards normalcy, The government will surely have to come up with an answer as to why millions of
citizens of a nation, whose constitution guarantees the right to live life with
dignity and personal liberty as a fundamental right,
were forced to spend several days and even months in such conditions, locked
away from their homes. Granted that the times are unprecedented and call for
desperate measures as the Government tries to keep the death toll in check, but
does that mean that we are to make way for subjacent tyranny dressed as
necessity? Even if India is able to curb the spread of COVID-19 can anyone
guarantee that the lives lost, the loss of livelihood suffered and ill the treatment meted out due to the colossal problem of Migrant Labourers can ever
be compensated? It must be remembered that the litmus test of democracy can
only happen in such times of catastrophe and it is in unprecedented situations
that the strength of the Constitution as the Guardian of Fundamental Rights is
judged.
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