The long road home: The exodus of migrant workers in South Asia during Covid-19

Luna Ranjit

In early 2020, as countries around the world went into various levels of lockdown trying to keep the COVID-19 virus away, South Asia joined them, even though there were few confirmed cases in the region. With only two confirmed cases, Nepal also closed its borders, including airports, and suspended public transportation with a day’s notice. Chaos ensued as the government and the people tried to make sense of what was going to happen next. I was scheduled to leave Kathmandu for New York two weeks later but with no option to travel, I stayed indoors, adjusting to the ‘new normal’ along with the rest of the world.

While the comfortable classes cribbed about not getting their exercise, we started hearing about another group of people walking. Migrant workers. Individuals who had left home seeking a better life in the cities and towns far away were left without jobs or money for rent, with only hunger looming ahead. So, they trudged back home, cramming all their worldly possessions into canvas bags and plastic — an exodus of families, young children and elderly grandparents, pregnant women and nursing mothers.

The news of people walking home first came from India, where the government had announced a three-week lockdown. The sea of people crowding train stations and bus depots, and walking along the empty highways in scorching heat became photographs that were circulated across the world.

In Nepal, walking started a little later. As the government announced the lockdown in one-week increments, people initially decided to wait it out. When the prospects of ending the lockdown kept moving further and further, and hunger became unbearable, they too started walking back home, up and down the hills and across Kathmandu valley.

Surya Bahadur Tamang, a porter, was found dead in the streets of Kirtipur outside Kathmandu, still holding the woven namlo he used to carry heavy loads. No one had ever bothered to ask him if he had family, or even how old he was. Hom Rana Magar, a young Nepali man, tried to cross a suspension bridge at night to avoid detection, after the local vigilante groups blocked it. The next day, his family found his body.

Between India and Nepal, the usually open border closed, leaving Indians stranded in Nepal and Nepalis left south of the border. Stuck for days in Dharchula, from where they could see their village, some young Nepalis risked their lives to swim across the roaring Mahakali river.

Both the lack of coordination and government oversight made misinformation spread like wildfire. Local vigilantes took it upon themselves to protect their neighborhoods by closing off “local borders” and harassing people passing through.

In most places, workers had to fend for themselves, with limited support from self-guided volunteer groups. In India, volunteers coordinated to find train tickets. Across Nepal and India, volunteers distributed food. Students on the outskirts of Kathmandu left shoes for the walkers to wear in their journey back home. It is unclear if they really needed shoes, but it was a jarring visual reminder to those of us ensconced in the comforts of our homes.

Activists and concerned public complained about mismanagement, but the governments refused to pay attention. A lawsuit was filed on behalf of the Nepali workers stuck in Dharchula, and the Supreme Court of Nepal ruled that they should be allowed to come back home. Yet, the government just ignored it for days. Instead of managing travel and quarantine facilities, governments focused on curtailing movements. On both sides of the border, police harassed the walkers — they lathi-charged and arrested anyone found outdoors regardless of whether they were out to get milk or medicines.

At the end of March, a picture circulated widely showing migrant workers who had reached Bareilly in northern India being sprayed with disinfectants meant to clean buses. Although the few cases in South Asia at that time had reached the subcontinent via people traveling by planes, the poorest amongst us were made to bear the brunt and treated like pariahs.

Art: *Where I am Exist* by Anjan Modak (b. 1982). Watercolour and graphite on acid free paper. 43 x 29.5 in. 2017, Kolkata.

As the news poured in about more and more migrant workers walking home, their stories became statistics and competed for our attention online alongside videos of Dalgona coffee recipes.

Some stories lingered a little bit longer.

Rajesh Chouhan is a 26-year old man. who was working at a construction site in the tech hub of Bangalore in southern India. He walked for more than a thousand miles to his home up north. With swollen legs and blistered feet, he walked for ten days dodging police and surviving on tea and biscuits.

Sixteen walkers, too exhausted to reach a station, laid down for the night on the tracks near Aurangabad. They did not know the schedule for the next train. Next morning, no one woke them up before the freight train arrived.

A young father carried his son home who had died on the journey. He chose to remain anonymous, afraid of being forced into quarantine if he asked for help.

Raju Sada, a 16-year old Dalit boy returning from India, died in a government quarantine in Janakpur in Nepal while waiting for his Covid-19 test results. No one went near him to administer medicines. The result came back negative.

Jamlo, a Muria Adivasi girl aged 12, dropped dead after walking almost a hundred miles through the forests. She had left her home in Chhattisgarh two months earlier to work in the chili fields in Telangana, earning 200 rupees a day. Her national ID card listed her name incorrectly in English.

These stories were not inevitable, and there are countless others. The exodus could have been avoided if the lockdowns had been planned with migrant workers in mind, and properly communicated. If their basic necessities were taken care of, they too would have sheltered in place. But the politicians and policymakers did not think about the millions already living precariously.

In rare cases, governments, like in Kerala, took steps to care for the migrant workers stuck in their area. Some employers continued to pay the workers, and some landlords agreed to forgo rent. But most cities, businesses, and individuals who benefited from their labour did not hesitate to abandon them at the first sign of a problem.

As the stories poured in, we lodged our indignation on social media. Eighteen months later, we seem to have forgotten most of the details. We are struggling to remember even the few names we did manage to learn.

As we slowly make our way back to our pre-pandemic life, how long will we remember the millions who were forced to walk hundreds of miles in sweltering heat with blisters on their feet? Will we remember Jamlo and Raju, and pause to think about all the other Jamlos and Rajus we never even heard about? Will our ‘new normal’ still have cracks where a 12-year old child can fall through and end up working in a chilli field a hundred miles away from home.

The art accompanying the article is “Where I am Exist”. Artist Anjan Modak represented by Emami Art, Kolkata, India. From the private collection of Anjana Somany, India.

People-2jfa1 December 2021