Migrant

Multiple social assistance schemes were launched during the first lockdown to help the poor in India, but not all eligible households took advantage of them. Studying slum households in Delhi to evaluate the efficacy of nine central and state government schemes show that the average gain was only `992 per household for a month. If all eligible households had received benefits, this figure would have been `1,956 per household, making the distribution much fairer. The schemes decreased the indebtedness of households by an average of 12.24%, but this would have been 24% if all eligible households had been covered.

The issues of migration and urbanisation are much debated in development literature, but often their negative consequences compared to positive impacts are highlighted. The conceptual and theoretical dimensions of the relationship between migration, urbanisation and development have been summarised, and their potential and actual impact on development has been presented.

The anti-migrant political environment in the city of Mumbai has created a confused sociopolitical and economic environment, where the migrant worker, essential to manufacturing and service provision, is able to find work, but is unwelcome in terms of occupying physical, social, political and cultural spaces in the city. The paper attempts to bring this contradiction to the fore through a study of elderly migrant labour employed in the private security provision industry. From the study it becomes apparent that the reality of the lives of workers is shaped by factors beyond work and wages. Their living conditions, inability to cope with any exigency, including illness or death, the atomised lives that they lead in the city in comparison to the villages, and absence of social security or access to quality welfare services force these workers and their families to live in precarious conditions.