In the first few days of the nationwide lockdown imposed in India to deal with the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was one recurring image that burst through the television screens in all its starkness – an unending procession of migrant workers deprived overnight of work, shelter and money, marooned in cities, facing hunger and health risks; and leaving the city to go to their villages. Trudging long distances with their families – men carrying young children on their shoulders, the women with their meagre belongings hoisted on their heads – for all bus and train services stood cancelled. Going without food for long stretches, often risking the ire of policemen who preferred to speak through their lathis, with no relief in sight, an unending procession of humans have been reduced to the status of detritus.

How the Lockdown Drove a Workforce on the Margins to Further Alienation