Labour’s Burden of the Epidemic COVID-19 and internal migrant workers: The case of India

Journal title MONDI MIGRANTI
Author/s Ranabir Samaddar
Publishing Year 2021 Issue 2021/1
Language English Pages 15 P. 143-157 File size 247 KB
DOI 10.3280/MM2021-001008
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The COVID-19 crisis in India produced severe disruptions in labour’s life and pro-cess, while it offered the rulers an opportunity to push further the neoliberal re-forms. In this context, questions of economy became a matter of life for millions of petty producers, informal labour including migrant labour, peasants, and other sections of society. The metamorphosis of economic questions into biopolitical issues had been never as evident as it was in the time of the pandemic. In the all round atmosphere of neo-liberalism where the state had retreated from public ed-ucation and public health, the priority for migrant workers was found to be absent. In this background the question of justice emerged as the backbone of rights. In-deed, one may ask: Will a rights-based approach to defend the existing entitle-ments of workers be enough? Or is there now an overwhelming need to centrally situate the issue of informal workers, of whom a significant section belongs to mi-grant population?

Keywords: Lockdown; COVID-19; epidemic; migrant worker; internal migration; informal labour; politics of life

Ranabir Samaddar, Labour’s Burden of the Epidemic COVID-19 and internal migrant workers: The case of India in "MONDI MIGRANTI" 1/2021, pp 143-157, DOI: 10.3280/MM2021-001008