Halt migrant workers in their tracks

Halt migrant workers in their tracks

Settle them in temporary shelters, pay them.

The march of tens of thousands of migrant workers back home from wherever they were working before the lockdown highlights the severe challenges a country as prone to chaos and disorder as India has to face. The best course is to halt them wherever they are, create temporary shelters to house them for the duration of the lockdown, feed them and pay them. If they continue to travel, by whatever mode, they pose an enormous health risk to themselves, to the communities they pass through and to those in the natal villages where they are headed. The entire purpose of the lockdown would be defeated.

Mobile phone companies have demonstrated their ability to open, suo motu, bank accounts for every subscriber, and some have been hauled up for such unilateral action. But this capability should be tapped now, accounts opened and money transferred to the mobile phone accounts of the poor, easily identified from their phone usage and recharge patterns. Tracking the movement of the phones, migrants on the move can be located and prioritised for payment. Banking correspondents with plenty of cash must be sent to migrant worker relief camps for migrants to hold cash in their hands. This would give them the confidence that they are not being left to fend for themselves. The announcement of a nationwide 21-day lockdown meant that these workers were left with no earnings. While the PM had appealed to everyone to stay put wherever they were, and food and other relief were announced later, the information did not percolate to those who needed it most. As per the 2011 Census, there are more than 60 million migrant workers, mostly from UP, Bihar, West Bengal and Odisha.

Terms like ‘social distancing’ and ‘stimulus’ mean little to them. For them, the lockdown, for 21 days and possibly longer, meant that they could not pay rents, would be rendered homeless, and without the means to pay for food. Going back to their villages, even on foot, was their only option. State governments and urban municipal bodies failed to step in to provide these workers and their families alternative facilities. Time to make up.