Prof. Rajan spoke during the virtual panel discussion held on the Global Compact For Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration Objective 1: “Collect and Utilize Accurate and Disaggregated Data as a Basis for Evidence-Based Policies” hosted by Global Research Forum on Diaspora and Transnationalism [GRFDT], Migrant Forum in Asia, Cross-Regional Centre for Refugees and Migrants, Civil Society Action Committee on 1st September 2020.
The speaker Prof. S. Irudaya Rajan is currently a Chair Professor at Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA)Research Unit on International Migration at the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. He has more than two decades of research experience in Kerala, where he has coordinated six major migration surveys. Prof. Rajan is also a member of the National Migration Policy drafting group appointed by the MOIA. as well he is an editor-in-chief at the Migration and Development Journal published by Routledge.
Lack of Data as a Main Obstacle
A key point that Prof. Rajan pointed out is how the March 24th lockdown showed up India’s failure to recognize data and attributed this to the fact that India has not integrated migration into development. According to him, the lack of database has resulted in discriminatory policies on handling migrants.
Consequently, none of the states in India during the lockdown was ready to handle internal migration. He stated that “there is no data on internal migration, no one has done migration as a separate survey”: Prof. Rajan. However he praised Kerala as the only state in the country that had sufficient data about its migrants and was able to write to the Prime Minister of India to bring back Kerala’s stranded migrants from abroad.
Not All Migrants Arethe Same
Talking about the different types of return migrants, Prof. Rajan indicated three main types of migrants such as: ‘normal return’, ‘return to re-migrate’ and ‘distress return’. He stressed on the fact that “return to re-migrate” migrants account for 1/3rd of the total migrant population and hence there is a need to have a detailed discussion about the issues revolving around them.
In general, Prof. Rajan pointed out the need for specific policies to be implemented for each of the return migrants mentioned above. However he regretted that implementing these policies is a challenge as it requires data which unfortunately is not available.
Considering lack of data in India as the main issue and challenge, Prof. Rajan announced that he and his team are“ working on an India Migration Survey which will come out in 2023, covering 740 000 households”: Prof Rajan.
Megha Rangaraj, the writer is an undergraduate student with Symbiosis School for Liberal Arts, Pune, India. She is an avid advocate for the emancipation of women and passionate about social issues. She can be found on twitter handle @MeghaRangaraj