Media, Migrants and the Pandemic in India

Bharat Bhushan is a journalist and editor based in Delhi. He was the foundereditor of Mail Today, Executive Editor of The Hindustan Times, Editor (Delhi) of The Telegraph, Editor of Catchnews .com , and Editor (Express News Service) and Washington Correspondent for The Indian Express. He writes on foreign policy and national politics. His other assignments include working as Assistant Editor for Business India and The Times of India and as Senior Academic Consultant for the Indian Council for Social Science Research.

List of figures

List of tables

List of contributors

Acknowledgements

Introduction

BHARAT BHUSHAN

PART 1

Lost in counting 9

1.1 Faceless and dispossessed: India’s circular migrants in the times of COVID-19

PRIYA DESHINGKAR

1.2 How many casual workers in the cities have sought to go home?

NOMAAN MAJID

1.3 Migration in India and the impact of the lockdown on migrants

MADHUNIKA IYER

1.4 Labour Commissioner puts total number of migrant workers at 26 lakh, says 10% in relief camps

GAURAV VIVEK BHATNAGAR

PART 2

Abandoned by law

2.1 Why India’s legal and labour system needs to be reconfigured to really help migrant workers

SATVIK VARMA

2.2 COVID-19 crisis exposes India’s neglect of informal workers

JENNY SULFATH AND BALU SUNILRAJ

2.3 National Commission for Women: Advisory to address needs of internal women migrants in India during COVID-19 lockdown

2.4 How the Supreme Court and the High Courts have dealt with the worst migrant crisis faced by the nation

EJAZ MAQBOOL, AKRITI CHAUBEY, AND MOHAMMAD ISA HAKIM

2.5 Migrant workers, the lockdown, and the judiciary

HARSH MANDER

2.6 Justice Madan Lokur: Supreme Court deserves an “F” grade for its handling of migrants

MADAN B. LOKUR

2.7 Women workers in labour codes

INDRANI MAZUMDAR AND NEETHA N. PILLAI

PART 3

The long march home

3.1 No train. No bus. Just a rickety cycle to cover 600 km – on an empty stomach

SUPRIYA SHARMA

3.2 Nightmare on Shramik Specials

V. SRIDHAR

3.3 Not just the Aurangabad accident, 383 people have died due to the punitive lockdown

KABIR AGARWAL

3.4 As Manipuri workers return home from Goa, what does the future hold for Baby Emmanuel Quarentino?

NANDITA HAKSAR

3.5 COVID-19: Odia women migrants suffer mental stress, feel nobody heeds their plight

RAKHI GHOSH

3.6 Between household abuse and employer apathy, domestic workers bear the brunt of lockdown

DEEPANSHU MOHAN, KENSIYA KENNEDY, MANSI SINGH, AND SHIVANI AGARWAL

3.7 Social distancing and sex workers in India

PRIYANKA TRIPATHI AND CHHANDITA DAS

PART 4

No wages, no jobs, no food

4.1 Can the State let employers walk away from lockdown wages?

BHARAT BHUSHAN

4.2 Hunger grows as India’s lockdown kills jobs

RAHUL LAHOTI, AMIT BASOLE, ROSA ABRAHAM, SURBHI KESAR, AND

PAARITOSH NATH

4.3 COVID-19: Intra-state migrants marooned too

BHANUPRIYA RAO

4.4 Bihar’s migrants return to face stigma, under-prepared medical facilities

PARUL AGRAWAL

4.5 Across India, workers complain that employers used lockdown to defraud them of wages they are owed

RAJIV KHANDELWAL

4.6 India cannot fight a pandemic with police lathis. It must ensure people have food – and dignity

SUPRIYA SHARMA

4.7 Differently abled migrant women workers grapple with the pandemic

VEDIKA KAKAR

4.8 Pandemic crisis: “Migrant home-based women workers work 8 hours/day for Rs 10–15”

CENNY THOMAS AND NIVEDITA JAYARAM

4.9 Pandemic-induced return of the migrant workers: Response of West Bengal

DEBASHIS AICH

PART 5

Pandemic as an opportunity: Changing labour laws

5.1 May Day: Twelve-hour working day notifications

JANE COX

5.2 Changes in labour laws will turn the clock back by over a century

RAMAPRIYA GOPALAKRISHNAN

5.3 Labour law changes: Innocuous mistakes, sleight of hand, or taking sides

ATUL SOOD AND PAARITOSH NATH

5.4 Why Adityanath’s simplistic Migration Commission is a non-starter

JUHIE SINGH

5.5 Can labour reforms help women migrant workers during COVID-19?

ELLINA SAMANTROY

PART 6

Media and migrant workers: Invisible become visible

6.1 Media in the time of COVID-19

BHUPEN SINGH

6.2 How the Modi government manufactured public opinion during the migrant crisis

AMAN ABHISHEK

6.3 Not just the media, organised politics too failed India’s migrant workers

RANABIR SAMADDAR

6.4 Migrant crisis amid COVID is why we need “journalism of misery”

SMRUTI KOPPIKAR

6.5 Lawyer Apar Gupta on what the Indian Supreme Court’s order on COVID-19 coverage means for journalists

KUNAL MAJUMDER

6.6 Audit of bigotry: How Indian media vilified Tablighi Jamaat over the coronavirus outbreak

AYAN SHARMA AND CHAHAK GUPTA

Afterword: Were any lessons learnt?

BHARAT BHUSHAN

Index