Bread, cloth and new housing challenge, migration will not stop, 80 per cent workers will be in their homes by June 30

The biggest blow to Corona’s lockdown has fallen on migrant workers. The closure of the business has created a livelihood crisis for them. So they are migrating in large numbers to their homes. Despite the efforts of the state governments, their migration has not stopped. Workers are arriving in their home state by bus and train. Large numbers of people are leaving on foot, by bicycle, truck, bus and train.

Four crore migrant workers are engaged in various jobs across the country. Since the nationwide lockdown was implemented, 7.5 million of them have returned home by trains and buses. This does not include the number of people coming by truck, bicycle or on foot. As such, about 20 percent of migrants have arrived home. If the migration process continues this way, by June 30, 80% of the migrant workers will be in their home countries. Which will pose new challenges for bread, clothing and home.

There are no official data on foreign labor in the country. But according to the 2011 census, the number of migrants in the country is 45.36 crore, which is 37 per cent of the total population of the country. This includes people who migrate from one state to another and within the state. About 5 crore such migrant laborers were working in Gujarat. Which includes country and state laborers. They want to go to their hometown, but don’t have the equipment. Trains fall short.

According to Amitabh Kundu, Professor of Research and Information Systems for Developing Countries, there are 6.5 crore inter-state migrants in the country. 33 per cent of them are laborers. One hundred percent of them are casual workers and one hundred percent work regularly in the unorganized sector. Professor Kundu has estimated the number of migrants in the country based on the 2011 census, NSSO survey and economic survey.

Most UP-Bihar foreigners

If street vendors are added to this, then the number of people living outside their home state will increase by about 1.2 to 18 million. The lockdown has also created a livelihood crisis for street vendors.

According to Professor Kundu, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar account for 25 per cent and 14 per cent of the total inter-state migrants in the country. It is followed by Rajasthan (6) and Madhya Pradesh (5). This means that about 40 to 60 lakh people in Uttar Pradesh want to return home. Similarly, 18 to 28 lakh people in Bihar are desperate to return home. From this point of view, 7 to 10 lakh people from Rajasthan and 6-7 lakh people from Madhya Pradesh want to return home.

21 lakh expatriates returned home from Uttar Pradesh

In Uttar Pradesh, 1,018 special labor trains have so far arrived from other parts of the country for migrant workers and more than 13.54 lakh migrant workers have returned home. Additional Chief Secretary and Home and Information – Avanish Kumar Awasthi said that so far 21 lakh people have come to the state by train, buses and other means. According to this, about half of the foreigners from Uttar Pradesh have reached home.

The Center says about four crore migrant workers across the country are engaged in various jobs and since the lockdown was implemented across the country, 75 lakh of them have returned home by train and buses. Punya Salila Srivastava, joint secretary in the Union Home Ministry, said the railways would run special trains of more than 2,600 laborers from May 1 to transport migrant workers from different parts of the country to their destinations.

Four million migrant workers in the country

He said there were 400 million migrant workers in the country as per the last census report. Workers trains. Millions of migrant workers have reached their destinations by special trains, while millions of migrants have reached their destinations by buses.

Workers have not only reached their home state by bus and train, but a large number of people have also been dispatched by foot, bicycle or truck. Therefore, these statistics do not indicate how many foreigners now live in their workplaces. Despite the ease of lockdown, economic activity is also being affected by labor shortages.