On March 25, my colleagues and I at the Aajeevika Bureau, which tries to address the economic and socio-legal problems of migrant workers in Gujarat and Rajasthan, woke up to dozens of messages of utter distress, both on our personal phones and on our toll-free Labour Line. Among the people who phoned was Devaram. He told us how, minutes after Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced a 21-day lockdown to contain the spread of the Covid-19 epidemic the previous night, he and 12 co-workers were told to pack their bags immediately. They were ordered to leave the textile factory premises in Ahmedabad that had doubled as their night sleeping spot for over six years.

Across India, workers complain that employers have defrauded them of wages they are owed