Covid19 & Plight of Indian Labourer
Covid19 has literally wrecked the humanity’s so called and assumed sophisticated perfected eco-system world over, it has shown the humanity that it needed to do a deep dive and realize that we are part of nature and not its master.
It’s impact in India has been very devastating and particularly very brutal on the Indian Labourers. The day India decided that in order to control the spread it needs to take some hard steps and it was way ahead then most developed nations to declare country wide lockdown, the day was 25th March 2020 and first phase was of 21 days, Since then we are under lockdown with some relaxation here and there. It has been nearly two months now and current phase of lockdown is to end on 31st May, given current covid19 numbers we are in for few more phases of lockdown.
Whatever saving the Indian labourers had it depleted fast, and to this class securing loan or credit is nearly impossible, Forced with no choice they started walking towards their hometown in hope that at least in pressing demands they will be better taken care by there near and dear ones. Given india’s size there count is in hundreds of million, and the distance they have to cover was in thousands of kilometers.
Of past two month Indian Media is showing such soul shaking plight of them, that it feels as if we are living in a different era altogether. The story includes a father cycling and endless journey with his two kids under scotching heat, and the kid in back of the cycle sleeping without worrying about a potential fall and serious injuries on highways, father is aware of the risks but what choice he has at least this way he sees a chance of keeping kids belly full. Another story shows a man wearing sleepers made by flattening discarded water bottles. Miles of miles of lines of labourer having a desperate need to reach their village and be with their dear ones.
I wonder why its this class which has suffered the most, after realizing the impact of them in our economy I consider them as the ones who had done all the heavy lifting and has helped us the fortunate ones to enjoy fruits of their labour be it enjoying driving on highways or being comfortable in our houses during current pandemic or working in our high end air conditioned offices or enjoying a ride in the metros. The skeleton and final touches have been given by these fine nameless artists.
When asked why they have to take such drastic measures they share stories of employers not paying the salaries, house owners demanding rent, even grocers also not lending them food items.
As major number of these laboures work in manufacturing units, I fail to understand the short sightedness displayed by employers here by not realizing that without labour how they will produce anything, and with labourers being scarce the labourers cost will increase, and they have lost the trust of their employees as by not helping them in need of time.
Now the house owner has given reasons that they need to take care of their expanses, now given tenant is gone how owners will manage their expanses now.
IMO we as a society have failed this highly motivated and high productive class and have left a very deep impact on their psyche that when need arises they will not find any support in these cities and it will be their village only that will be theirs last resort. I am not sure how long it will take for them to get out of this trauma and once again become the crucial enabler of our engine of growth. Till then the long lasting impact of this will be on our economy as without labourers how MSMEs will gain momentum, and bringing economy back on foot will be very challenging tasks for the government.
I want to part on a note that most of us do feel sorry for their state, but as a society what more we could have done to make sure that they felt at home and safe in our cities.
P.S. There are lot of NGOs who did their best but still looking at numbers of people it didn’t had much impact.