Crisis Within a Crisis: Migrant Workers’ Predicament During COVID-19 Lockdown and the Role of Non-profit Organizations in India

This article explores the role of non-profit organisations in mitigating crisis for the urban working poor during the pandemic in India. We focus specifically on the humanitarian crisis around the interstate migrant workers that resulted from the Indian government’s efforts to contain the pandemic by imposing a nationwide lockdown. Through in-depth interviews with leaders of non-profit organisations in India, who were actively engaged in relief work during the migrant crisis, we explore the role of poverty and inequality in exacerbating the pandemic’s impact. Our findings indicate that multiple dimensions of inequality combined to aggravate the effects of the lockdown on interstate migrant labourers in India. The government’s initial apathy towards this vulnerable group, delay in addressing the unanticipated consequences of the pandemic response, and its ineffective crisis management efforts resulted in a humanitarian crisis in the country concurrent to the pandemic. In this context, the non-profit sector played a critical supporting role in mitigating the migrant workers’ crisis during the pandemic.