As many as 56.5% migrant workers who returned to Madhya Pradesh from Maharashtra during the COVID-19-induced lockdown were unemployed, while those engaged in work were earning much less than before, according to a survey.
Also read: Over 1 crore migrant labourers return to home states on foot during Mar-Jun: Govt
Further, 67% of the 1,500 respondents who returned in May and June across Madhya Pradesh demanded urgent relief to support their families. And 90% of them had not received any monetary relief promised by the government, said a survey undertaken by two law graduates, an engineering student and Zenith Society for Socio-Legal Empowerment, Shivpuri, with the aid of 50 volunteers.
While 43% said they are engaged in some kind of work, around 22% were employed in agriculture-related work or farming in their own fields. “In some cases, the entire family works on a single field resulting in cases of disguised unemployment,” said the executive summary of the report titled ‘MP Migrant Worker Project’.
Through the report, the surveyors intended to bridge the data gap regarding the status of the workers and highlight their situation which was being conveniently forgotten, said Rakshita Agarwal, a graduate of the National Law University Odisha.
Also read: Less than 34,000 inter-State migrant workers in 2019-20, says government
“We are identifying pressing issues being faced by the workers and approaching authorities with solutions,” said Ms. Agarwal. “We don’t want this to end as a report, but bring about real, tangible changes wherever we can.”
In addition, the survey had brought out changes in income patterns of the returned workers. At their places of work in Maharashtra, the summary said, 59% of the respondents earned ₹300-500 a day. But now, 49% of them earned that much, affecting their living standards.
Most workers, at 58%, said their travel was funded entirely by the government, which also provided them with bus facilities to their villages from railway stations. As for the future, 51.79% of the respondents wished to settle in Madhya Pradesh and looked for local employment opportunities.
