ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with policy and governance challenges surrounding internal labour migration in India. It particularly focuses on institutional responses during the COVID-19 pandemic-induced crisis and its aftermath. It draws upon the authors’ experiences as a policymaker and policy practitioner, respectively, and their collaboration on evidence-to-policy initiatives with state governments and stakeholders. In doing so, it addresses the under-focused policy area of internal labour migration, around and after the pandemic. The authors highlight how the lockdown brought to light the precarity, vulnerability, and exploitation faced by migrant workers, prompting necessary policy actions from both the Central and state governments.
The chapter discusses the broader policy challenges around securing the welfare of migrant workers in India, primarily focusing on three key aspects: Institutional capacity challenges, lack of cohesive policy discourse, and lack of cohesive migration data and estimates.
Through a comprehensive analysis of the above, informed by a combined lens of a policymaker and a practitioner, the chapter will offer valuable policy insights to policymakers, researchers, and practitioners on the institutional challenges and lessons learned from policy interventions in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. Relevant academic and policy literature in India on internal migration has mostly focused on drivers of migration, the role of social welfare, and resilient livelihoods to mitigate distress migration and lived experiences of migrant workers in destination sites. This chapter will add suitable scholarship with regard to the relationship between internal migration, particularly inter-state migration, and federalism in the context of labour as a subject in the concurrent list of the Indian Constitution.
Emphasising collaborative, decentralised community-focused initiatives, the chapter advocates for strengthening technical and subject knowledge of the labour bureaucracy and implementing data-driven mechanisms involving key stakeholders to prioritise the safety, well-being, and welfare of migrant workers and their families in both destination and source regions.
