ABSTRACT
The mass exodus of migrant labour in the wake of the national lockdown in March 2020 exposed more than the central government’s lack of planning and sensitivity to the conditions of this labour force; it provided a sudden but spontaneous visibility to the full force of the distress and insecurity of migrant workers. The state government’s response to the humanitarian crisis was marked by a rare degree of concern. However, the government employed a rhetoric of care that, along with some hostile public perceptions of migrant workers, brought into view the undermining of the citizenship of migrant workers. A widely cited estimate derived from a study by the Gulati Institute of Finance and Taxation in 2013 puts the current number of inter-state migrant workers at more than 3.5 million. The state labour commissioner, who has received praise for his proactive responses, observed that ‘the idea of camp was conceptual, rather than in physical terms’.
