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THEME PAPER
challenging to evolve a uncertain access to social focus on preventing migration
rational policy response. welfare. While the former through strengthening rural
apply to specific sectors development while migrant
MIGRATION AS considered critical to human inclusion in cities is severely
REFLECTED IN POLICY development like education, constrained by a lack of
Owing to the prevalence of health and nutrition, most capacity and resources (Xiang
economic framings, migration schemes are designed around et al 2022).
has been primarily addressed eligibility requirements In 2016-17, migration briefly
in policy through the lens of owing to fiscal and political received attention in policy
labour via legislations like the considerations. Scheme circles. In the wake of the UN
Interstate Migrant Workers design and implementation Habitat’s efforts to evolve a
(Regulation of Employment vary across levels of New Urban Agenda and a
and Conditions of Service) government as well as across growing conversation around
Act, 1979. Migration has rural and urban jurisdictions. India’s efforts at meeting the
been strongly linked to work While welfare schemes, SDGs, the erstwhile Ministry
and was squarely under the formulated and funded by the of Housing and Urban
purview of the Ministry of Government of India, tend to Poverty Alleviation, Govt.
Labour and Employment be more universal in nature, of India constituted an inter-
(MoLE). The issue of migration state policies and schemes ministerial Working Group
appeared only fleetingly almost always include on Migration to “address
in other areas of policy. domicile as eligibility criteria the impact of migration on
For example, the Right to (Centre for Policy Research housing, infrastructure and
Education Act 2009 mandates & UNICEF 2021). Sectoral livelihoods” . The Working
1
schools to admit migrant programs like the Building Group submitted its report
children and the Integrated and Construction Workers in 2017 (Government of
Child Development Services Board, funded through a cess India 2017); however, the
(ICDS) scheme of the levied on construction, also recommendations were
Ministry of Women and – while centrally legislated – not formally addressed at
Child Development is also, in remained organised by states, the time. With concerns
terms of intention, inclusive which preferred to register over India’s demographic
of migrants. Labour-centric their own residents (Roy et dividend and economic future
frameworks have dwelt al 2017). The access to the looming large, a chapter
on problems related to Public Distribution System on internal migration and
informal employment and the (PDS) also remained tied to labour mobility was included
challenges of delivering social specific locations, with ration in the 2016-17 Economic
protection to unorganised cards tagged to specific fair Survey. It emphasised the
workers, with migrants as a price shops (Government need to consider mobility as
subset of this dominant issue. of India 2017). At the same an important and desirable
time, a strong sedentary
Owing to contrasting logics bias and more effective feature of India’s economic
of universalisation and decentralisation in rural landscape. However, these
eligibility, migrants have contexts have retained the policy efforts did not gain
further traction.
Thus, though policy experts
1 The Terms of Reference of the Working Group on Migration. Ministry of Housing
and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Housing Division, letter no O17034/18/2015-H/ and civil society had been
FTS-12940 dated 28th July 2015. raising the issue for some
38 HUDCO-HSMI Publication
