COVID-19 AND ITS IMPACT ON MIGRANT WORKERS IN INDIA
Keywords:
Coronavirus, Family, Human Rights, Lockdown, Migrant Workers, Moral ResponsibilityAbstract
The Covid-19 pandemic has made migrant issues unforeseeable, unbearable and beyond comprehensive scrutiny. Internal informal migrant workers of India had a bolt out of the blue to their life and livelihood by the unexpected and poorly coordinated nationwide lockdown imposed on 24 March 2020 by the central government to contain the spread of the Coronavirus. The unprecedented, unreasonable, and ungraded complete stringent nationwide lockdown showcases the true and yet disgusting fate of the migrant workers in India, an abandoned and unaccounted workforce in the country.
The author describes some of the tragic experiences of migrant workers due to the denial of fundamental human rights.In the second section, the author proposes a few measures for the welfare of migrants in India.What is urgent is to see issues by putting on one’s migrant garb along cultural and religious belief lines. In such circumstances, the author suggests that act according to one’s well-informed conscience than by the measure of convenience.
References
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Ajit Prakash Shah, “Failing to perform as a constitutional court,” https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/failing-to-perform-as-a-constitutional-court/article31665557.ece (15.10.2020)
Arabinda K. Padhee, Basanta K. Kar and Pranab R. Choudhury, “The Lockdown Revealed the Extent of Poverty and Misery Faced by Migrant Workers,”https://thewire.in/author/arabinda-k-padhee-basanta-k-kar-and-pranab-r-choud (19.09.2020)
Chetan Choithani & Reshma Roshania, “Why Do We Treat Internal Migrants Differently from International Migrants?” The Wire, 28 May 2020, https://thewire.in/rights/migrants-internal-international-lockdown (09.10.2020).
Choithani & Roshania, “Why Do We Treat Internal Migrants Differently from International Migrants?”
Ergamigrantes caritas Christi. The Love of Christ towards Migrants, Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, Vatican City, 2004, §1.
Goregaonkar, “Deserted, Demeaned and Distressed: The Lot of Migrant Workers in the Delhi-Haryana Region.”
https://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/2020/may/14/rss-backed-bharatiya-mazdoor-sangh-announces-nationwide-agitation-against-new-labour-laws-passed-by-2143354.html (14 October 2020)
https://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/2020/may/14/rss-backed-bharatiya-mazdoor-sangh-announces-nationwide-agitation-against-new-labour-laws-passed-by-2143354.html (14 October 2020)
Jawhar Sircar, “A Long Look at Exactly Why and How India Failed Its Migrant Workers,” 29 May 2020. https://thewire.in/labour/lockdown-migrant-workers-policy-analysis (9.10.2020)
K. Srinath Reddy, “A Mistaken Measure of Global Health Security,” The New Indian Express, 2 April 2021. https://www.newindianexpress.com/opinions/2021/apr/03/a-mistaken-measure-of-global-health-security-2285122.html.
Kaleeshwaram Raj, “Freedom in the time of COVID-19,” The New Indian Express, 8 April 2020. https://www.newindianexpress.com/opinions/2020/apr/08/freedom-in-the-time-of-covid-19-2127186.html
Kavaljit Singh, “COVID-19 Has Pushed the Indian Economy into a Tailspin. But There’s a Way Out,” 21 September 2020, https://thewire.in/economy/covid-19-india-economic-recovery (14.10.2020).
Navmee Goregaonkar, “Deserted, Demeaned and Distressed: The Lot of Migrant Workers in the Delhi-Haryana Region,” The Wire, 29 May 2020, https://thewire.in/rights/migrant-workers-delhi-haryana-lockdown (09.10.2020).
Nilanjana Bhowmick,“The Coronavirus Pandemic has Left Many of India’s Poor without Jobs, Food, or a Way to Get Home,” https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/05/they-treat-us-like-stray-dogs-migrant-workers-flee-india-cities/ (19.09.2020).
P. Chidambaram and P. Chakravarty, “A Blueprint to Revive the Economy, ”The Hindu, 17 April 2020. https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/a-blueprint-to-revive-the-economy/article31359290.ece
Pratap Bhanu Mehta, “Ordinances by States to Change Labour laws are a Travesty,” The New Indian Express, May 12, 2020 https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/industrial-relations-code-india-labour-law-amendment-pratap-bhanu-mehta-6405265 (02.10.2020)
T.J.S. George, “Democracy Even in Times of Covid,” The New Indian Express, “Point of View,” 4 April 2021.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Samaritanus bonus, 2020.
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Published
2022-01-01
How to Cite
Kochappilly, P. (2022). COVID-19 AND ITS IMPACT ON MIGRANT WORKERS IN INDIA. Asian Horizons, (1), 58–72. Retrieved from https://dvkjournals.in/index.php/ah/article/view/3726
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