Syed Ali Mujtaba. Siyasat.net
The most powerful theme during the Covid-19 is the so called social murder of the migrant workers committed allegedly by the Prime Minister of India who knowingly or unknowingly created conditions for them when he announced the nationwide lock down on March 24, 2020 in just four hours of notice.
This singular announcement deprived some Eight crore (80000000) people from bare necessities of daily living and pushed them in a position of hunger, starvation and beggar for mercy.
The entire country is witness to this social murder committed by the central government who pushed a large swath of population into destitute. Perhaps after the Bengal famine of 1943, this is the singular manmade disaster created by the self-appointed C-in-C to lead the Covid 19 war.
The story of the poorest migration to urban India could be traced to the neo-liberalism that started in the 1990s with the opening up of the economy in India. All and sundry from the countryside started flocking into the big cities lured by opportunities and exciting possibilities. These cities not only sustained them but also improved the wellbeing of their life and also of their families in the native villages.
According to the 2010 census there were Four crore migrant workers engaged in various works in different parts of urban India. This Four crore now is estimated to have swelled to Eight crore according to some unofficial reports.
As the Madhya Pradesh operation-topple got over on March 21, the government woke up to the threats of Covid 19 and abruptly announced the lock down of the country on March 24, 2020.
This singular announcement closed down the construction activities, factories and industries and other allied activities lock stock and barrel. The majority of the workforce employed in these economic activities became jobless as employers pushed them out of their premises without giving them any salary or succor for survival.
This horrendous move forced the laborers to an uncertain future and willy-nilly they had to return to their native places with nothing to eat. The reverse migration is one of the biggest stories of independent India caused by the hasty decision of the Prime Minister of the country.
The sudden lock down created an economic and humanitarian crisis unprecedented in the country. The most shocking fact was the national media initially decided to sit out of this story, but when economic hardship and denial of life became heart rendering, a few media outlets did come in open to narrate the human suffering created by the ill-conceived idea of lock down to contain the Covid-19.
The government’s sudden decision to shut the nation stripped invisible millions of their livelihood as 81 % of the urban population, 87% of the rural population lost their jobs. In April alone, some 1220 crore jobs were lost and about 1215 lakh workers were rendered jobless. The unemployment rate shot up to an unprecedented 26% from 8% due to nationwide lock down. Further, the economic growth fell to a zero, with some financial institutions pegging it at 0.1 GDP%, and some even giving it negative points.
Industrialist Rajiv Bajaj succulently summed up these phenomena; “A draconian but porous lockdown to slow the spread of coronavirus ended up flattening the wrong curve and left the country with the worst of both worlds.”
When Prime Minister Modi announced the first lockdown he was reported to have said, his one crore party members will feed five people each from March 26, totaling almost 265 crore plates of food. But no BJP member came forward to feed the hungry on the ground.
What actually happened were the chilling images beamed o the TV sets of a man eating raw meat of a dead animal at a national highway, a man using his bare hand to drink spilt milk on the road while a dog was licking the same, a toddler playing with her dead mother’s corpse on a railway platform, as sidelight of the lock down.
The images also told the most humiliating story of the police brutality committed on these migrant workers to enforce the lockdown. The police were seen flogging the half-dead migrants in a bid to stop them from being infected by the Coronavirus. The brutality of the police force on the helpless migrant workers will remain etched on the minds of all those who watched such images on their TV sets.
Why the order did to the police not come with the message of being compassionate to migrant workers is a sad commentary on the uncouth elements that are running the largest democracy in the world.
It is a matter of introspection why the lockdown was not announced a week after these workers was sent home safely. The only answer is that forming the BJP IN Madhya Pradesh was more important than the Covid-19.
Since the lockdown was announced after the disaster management act was operation, the central government did not take up the responsibility to make the arrangements to transport the people affected by the government’s announcement. What the central government did was to shift its burden on the state government and this burden was tossed back and forth till the workers decided to take toughest journeys of their lives.
With their livelihoods being stripped and nothing being left for them to fall back, the workers had decided to walk miles, covering 500-1000 km at a stretch. Soon the trickle became an exodus and highways were stamped with the invisible million’s bleeding feet, as men, women and children walked on foot or on their rickety cycles, most often without footwear.
The workers braving the scorching sun, carrying their meager belongings, also their tiny tots, some even their old parents on their backs made their arduous journey. On the way they were treated with disdain and had to face police brutality and humiliation. They were seen being sprayed with insecticide as if they are the carriers of the coronavirus. In their entire journey hardly a few came forward to mitigate their sufferings.
Accidents were another fatal blow to these migrant workers on the move. Nearly 200 migrant workers died in road accidents and the majority of deaths in accidents took place during the third phase of the lockdown (May 4 – May 17).
In one of the heart-rending accidents, 16 migrant workers were crushed to death by a freight train in Maharashtra’s Aurangabad district on May 8. The workers were tired and slept on the tracks when the train ran over them. In another accident, at least eight people died when a truck they were traveling in collided with a bus in Madhya Pradesh’s Guna on May 14. Likewise, on May 16 at least 24 migrant laborers were killed when a truck in which they were travelling collided with another vehicle in Uttar Pradesh’s Auraiya.
The fact that the government announced the ’shramik special’ trains to ferry stranded migrant workers to their native places but the first such train ferried passengers on May 1. Here the question is why only 300 trains were pressed into service initially, when Railway has the capacity to run 19 000 trains daily.
The ‘shramik special’ were started especially to ferry the passengers’ free of cost but a big fuss was made as to who will foot the bill. The central government passed the buck on state government and after the buck being passed back and forth it was extracted from the passengers, some say the cumulative income was Rs 20-22 crores.
The most outrageous thing that happened was when two of the “shramik” trains headed for Bihar, one reached Orissa, the other Delhi! All such trains were running for 40 hours and had no arrangements for food or water. This was how the train journey of migrant workers took place under Covid -19 lock down.
If the foot and train journey were miserable, the bus journey was still painful for the migrant workers. Hearing the rumor that free buses were arranged for them to take home they gathered with their families at Anand Vihar bus terminal in Delhi but soon they realized that it was a hoax and so they decided to walk their way. There was utter confusion in providing them the services. Again the centre and state governments had tiff on bearing the cost in the end when the buses were pressed into service it overcharged laborers for the journey that was meant to be free of cost for them.
On reaching home these labors did not get any comfort. The government provided little direct relief to them to take care of their livelihood. On the other hand, several state governments decided to suspend labor laws, including minimum safety norms, even subjecting them to 12 hour work days.
Even as all these were happening acrimony between UP Chief Minister Yogi Aditya Nath and MNS chief, Raj Thackeray broke out on the issue of laborers. The UP CM announced to ‘seek permission for migrant workers’ and MNS leader retorting ‘laborers will have to seek nod of the Maharashtra government if they wish to work there.’
The fifty four days lockdown of the country from March 25 to May 31st was the harshest punishment given to the country to contain the spread of the Covid-19. It was done without proper planning and foreseeing the difficulties of the people especially the migrant workers.
While one government order took away the livelihood from them there was no economic support provided to them. The impact of the lock down unstitched the vulnerability of this segment of the society to the bleeding point. The fact is even basic justice was denied to them. This was the most unjust aspect of the current dispensation under Covid 19 lockdown.
These migrant workers are in dire need of a national register for meaningful socio-economic interventions to be made to them. But no government is keen to do such exercise. They want to use them as vote banks for elections and abuse them during the time of crisis. Neither the government nor the society has any remorse towards their sufferings. So no bell tolls for the migrant workers in India, this is the sum and summary of the migrant workers story under the Covid-19.(views are personal)
Siyasat.net is Ahmedabad, Gujarat,India Based website)
