Impact of COVID-19 on Migrant Workers: Issues and Challenges

A democratic society is marked by constitutionalism, human rights and social justice. One of the key features of a democratic community is that it should be free from inequity, injustice and unfairness in treatment. However, a country like India is still struggling to avoid these unacceptable occurrences. Recently, we saw a great human tragedy during the lockdown period when the migrant workers were forced to abandon their places of work due to the loss of jobs and decided to walk out on foot under severe conditions. Previously, the abject poverty forced them to migrate to cities in search of green pasture but unfortunately, they could not find it. Moreover, whatever meager jobs they got, they lost that also during the period due to this ongoing adverse condition. The painful story that we heard from the media, NGOs and other activists was very sad and it moved all the sensible persons who believe in democracy and social justice so much so that they could not stop expressing regrets for the society we live in