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International Migration in India - Eco
International Migration in India - Eco
shortages, orderly and well-managed labour migration can lighten labour scarcity
and facilitate mobility.
International migration occurs when peoples cross state boundaries and stay
in the host state for some minimum length of time. Migration occurs for many
reasons. Many people leave their home countries in order to look for economic
opportunities in another country. Others migrate to be with family members who
have migrated or because of political conditions in their countries. Education is
another reason for international migration, as students pursue their studies abroad.
While there are several different potential systems for categorizing international
migrants, one system organizes them into nine groups: temporary labour migrants;
irregular, illegal, or undocumented migrants; highly skilled and business migrants;
refugees; asylum seekers; forced migration; family members; return migrants; and
long-term, low-skilled migrants. These migrants can also be divided into two large
groups, permanent and temporary. Permanent migrants intend to establish their
permanent residence in a new country and possibly obtain that countrys citizenship.
Temporary migrants intend only to stay for a limited periods of time; perhaps until
the end of a particular program of study or for the duration of a work contract or a
certain work season. Both types of migrants have a significant effect on the
economies and societies of the chosen destination country and the country of origin.
Similarly, the countries which receive these migrants are often grouped into
four categories: traditional settlement countries, European countries which
encouraged labour migration after World War II, European countries which receive a
significant portion of their immigrant populations from their former colonies, and
countries which formerly were points of emigration but have recently emerged as
immigrant destinations.
HISTORY
Looking at the history of migration from Indian subcontinent in the last two
centuries four waves of substantial emigration are quite distinguishable. The ftrst
wave, which started in the 1830s and spanned a little over a century, dominated by
Indian labour imported to ftll the supply gaps in the plantations in British and other
colonies, viz., Mauritius, South Africa, Malaya, Fiji, and other Caribbean countries.
During the second wave that took place especially after World War II, majority of
Indian migrants headed towards the industrial nations of Europe and North America.
Emigration of Indians to the Gulf in the 1970s, particularly in the wake of massive
extraction of petroleum products and the subsequent construction boom, constitutes
the third wave. Beginning in the 19908 and picking up in the 21'1 century, the fourth
phase of substantial migration from India consists of software professionals who
have migrated to the Western countries in general and to the US in particular.
But unlike these earlier waves, migration patterns from India today portray a
paradigm shift. Not only the UK, the US, Australia, Canada and the Gulf but a large
number of countries in the European Union, countries in Africa and Asia are
emerging major destinations for Indian emigrants. Moreover, India is not only seen
as a source of getting manpower, it also continues to be considered a must
destination for internationally renowned educational institutions to woo the Indian
students (Khadria, 2002). This provides foreign exchange to the education exporting
institutions/ countries and enhances students' educational and economic profile. A
foreign degree also opens gateways to enter in the labour market of that country
unless the law of the immigrant country prohibits them.
The immigration policies of the destination countries are being reshaped and
remodeled by three important factors, va.,
Gulf counties
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The paper addresses issues related to the promotion and sustenance of international
labour migration from India on the one hand and protection of migrant workers on
the other. It reveals that labour migration flows from India since 1990s have not only
registered impressive growth in respect of the traditional destinations like the United
States of America, the United Kingdom, Canada and the Gulf countries but also have
diversified and expanded to newly emerging migrant destinations in continental
Europe, Australasia, East Asia and South-East Asia. The paper observes that a proactive migration policy framework will further cement these trends.
The paper provides a detailed evaluation of the Emigration Act, 1983, the most
important policy instrument governing the migration of Indian workers for overseas
employment on a contractual basis.
It argues that that the Act needs to be reoriented so that it provides a legislative basis
for better protection and welfare of the migrants on the one hand and for the active
promotion of international labour migration from India on the other. It notes that the
Act needs to be modified to check the activities of the unscrupulous agents and to
make it harder for agents to cheat Indian workers who are keen on migrating
overseas for employment. The grievance redressal system must also be made more
effective.
It observes that apart from strengthening and reorienting the Emigration Act, the
system to monitor its implementation should be strengthened. The paper further
highlights the need for international labour migration policy to provide increasing
emphasis to promotion and facilitation of external labour flows from India and not
be limited only to regulating and protecting functions of the State.
The paper observes that the rapid expansion of IT and IT enabled industry in India
during the last decade is encouraging a large number of Indian migrants to return and
set up business ventures in India.
Such a trend of to and fro movement of professionals and ideas require that the
migration of highly skilled labour be possibly situated within the framework of
'brain gain'. The paper notes that the changing immigration policies in major
destination countries must be reviewed from time to time so that it serves as the
basis for evolving more acceptable mutual agreements on labour migration between
India and the destination countries. Considering that India is the world's largest
recipient of migrant workers' remittances, the paper notes that there is a need evolve
an information-based and value-generative plan to make optimum use of the
available funds. The paper also highlights the need for strengthening multilateral
cooperation to transform migration into an efficient, orderly and humane process.
They left for British, Dutch and French colonies to work in sugar plantations
and subsequently for the tea and rubber plantations of Southeast Asia. Similar
demands for labour rose internally with the growth of tea, coffee and rubber
plantations, coal mines and, later, modern industry. Much of this labour was
procured through some form of organised mediation and some portion of it remained
circulatory and retained strong links with the areas of origin. But as it settled down,
it provided a bridgehead to other migrants, whose numbers grew to satisfy colonial
demand. Urban pockets like Kolkatta and Mumbai attracted rural labourers mainly
from labour catchment areas like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Orissa in the east and
Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and parts of Kerala and Karnataka in the south. The
historical pattern of the flow of labourers persisted even after independence.
In a country of Indias size, the existence of significant regional disparities
should not come as a surprise. The scale and growth of these disparities is, however,
of concern. The ratio between the highest to lowest state per capita incomes,
represented by Punjab and Bihar in the first period, and Maharashtra and Bihar in the
second period, has increased from 2.6 in 198083 to 3.5 in 199700. The Planning
Commission estimates that 26.1% of Indias population lives below the poverty line
(based on the controversial National Sample Survey of 19992000). The rural poor
has gradually concentrated in eastern India and rain fed parts of central and western
India, which continue to have low-productivity agriculture. In 19992000, the states
with the highest poverty levels were: Orissa (47.2%), Bihar (41.2%), Madhya
Pradesh (37.4%), Assam(36.1%) and Uttar Pradesh (31.2%) Generally, Indias poor
have meagre physical assets and human capital and belong largely to socially
deprived groups such as scheduled castes (SC) and tribes (ST). Women share an
extraordinary burden of deprivation within households. The poor rely on different
types of work to construct a livelihood; wage labour and cultivation are the most
important. Earlier studies have shown that poor households participate extensively in
migration. More recent studies have reconfirmed that migration is a significant
livelihood strategy for poor households in several regions of India.
As the UN specialized agency on labour issues, the ILO has been dealing with
labour migration since its foundation in 1919. The very Constitution of the ILO
specifically mandates the organization in its Preamble to give attention to the
"protection of the interests of workers when employed in countries other than their
own". The International Migration Branch (MIGRANT) is the main unit responsible
for labour migration issues in the ILO.
MIGRANT promotes the ratification and implementation of international
standards; facilitates the participation of ILO's tripartite constituents in formulating
and implementing migration policy; provides advisory services and a forum for
consultations; serves as a global knowledge base on international labour migration;
and conducts or coordinates various projects to strengthen the capacity of ILO's
tripartite constituents and other relevant partners such as non-governmental
organizations and migrants' associations, to deal with a wide range of labour
migration issues.
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IOMS OBJECTIVES
In its labour migration programming, IOM builds capacity in labour migration
management by:
offering policy and technical advice to national governments;
supporting the development of policies, legislation and administrative structures that
promote efficient, effective and transparent labour migration flows;
assisting governments to promote safe labour migration practices for their nationals;
facilitating the recruitment of workers, including pre-departure training and
embarkation preparedness;
Promoting the integration of labour migrants in their new workplace and society.
PRINCIPAL BENEFICIARIES
IOM implements various labour migration programs in 70 countries.
beneficiaries of these programs include:
migrants, their families and their communities;
local and national governments;
private sector entities such as employers and industry representatives; and
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The
regional organizations.
IOMs Approach
Through its global network of more than 440 offices, IOM is able to bring together
governments, civil society and the private sector to establish labour migration
programs and mechanisms that balance their various interests, and address migrants
needs. The IOM approach to international labour migration is to foster the synergies
between labour migration and development, and to promote legal avenues of labour
migration as an alternative to irregular migration. Moreover, IOM aims to facilitate
the development of policies and programs that are in the interest of migrants and
society, providing effective protection and assistance to labour migrants and their
families.
internal migrants as international migrants although they did not cross a border in the
interim. Attempts to barricade borders may not have been the dominant factor in
limiting expansion of international migration. Irregular migration is ubiquitous and
pervasive. In the United States there are probably more than ten million irregular
migrants, and additional border enforcement seems to have done little
to stem the flow (Hanson 2006). Various observers estimate some 510 million
irregular migrants in Europe; and even such nations as Japan and Saudi Arabia are
reported to have significant numbers of undocumented workers.3 Among many of
the developing nations, where entry requirements are often ill defined and poorly
enforced, irregular migration is actually the norm. The dominant restraint on
international migration is surely a reluctance to relocate, despite widening income
gaps between the poorest and wealthiest nations.Most people would simply rather
stay home, though many are impelled to migrate by the failure of employment to
keep pace with the labor force or the lack of security in their home countries.
Leaving out the newly defined migrants created by the dissolution of the former
Soviet Union, about 56 percent of the worlds international migrants were in the
More Developed Regions (according to UN definitions) in 2000. This followed a
steady increase from 40 percent in 1960. However, a large portion of migrants in the
More Developed Regions are from other high-income countries.For instance, almost
exactly half of the stock of migrants in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation
and Development (OECD) member states in 2000 were from other OECD states;
more than a third of all migrants came from OECD members other than Mexico and
Turkey. Since 1990 and the release of the findings of the U.S. Commission for the
Study of International Migration and Cooperative Economic Development, the
notion of a migration hump has passed into conventional wisdom. The notion is
that emigration rates initially rise then fall as states become more prosperous.
Yet there is little evidence to support this hypothesis.4 Net migration from
theRobert E. B. Lucas |least-developed countries is no lower than from their slightly
more prosperous counterparts. It is true, however, that the poorest nations have lower
emigration rates to the OECD states. Much of the migration from the leastdeveloped countries appears to be into neighboring developing countries. Geography
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has much to do with this. Distance deters migration, and the least-developed
countries are generally more remote from the industrialized world. Indeed, given the
major region of origin, there is no clear tendency for emigration to the OECD states
to increase with the level of development; the lack of migration from the lowestincome countries to the OECD states thus reflects their geography far more than
reflecting any migration hump based on income.
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CAUSES OF MIGRATION
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Given the diversity in the nature of migration in India, the causes are also
bound to vary. Migration is influenced both by the pattern of development, and the
social structure. The National Commission on Rural Labour, focusing on seasonal
migration, concluded that uneven development was the main cause of seasonal
migration. Along with inter regional disparity, disparity between different socio
economic classes and the development policy adopted since independence has
accelerated the process of seasonal migration. In tribal regions, intrusion of
outsiders, the pattern of settlement, displacement and deforestation, also have played
a significant role. Most migration literature makes a distinction between pull and
push factors, which, however, do not operate in isolation of one another. Mobility
occurs
when
workers
in
source
areas
lack
suitable
options
for
Factors such as age, education level, wealth, land owned, productivity and
job opportunities influence the participation of individuals and households in
migration, but so do social attitudes and supporting social networks.
Where
services sector, and the informal sector is more prominent today, both in developing
and developed countries than it was twenty or thirty years ago. In developing
countries, the informal sector is no longer conceived as a temporary destination for
migrants but in most cases, as a final destination. The (changing) structural features
of world capitalism have an important bearing on both internal and international
migration.
The theme on labour migration will explore all types of labour migration
internal, inter-state, cross-border and international. It will encourage cross
disciplinary studies and papers based on both fieldwork and secondary data.
We would welcome papers which explore not only economic issues but also
historical, political, sociological and psychological factors affecting labour migration
and the consequences of migration at more disaggregate levels, viz., for various
socio-economic strata and segments of the population and for women, men, the
elderly and children separately, wherever possible. The contributors should confine
themselves to the issue of worker migration, as conventionally defined in SNA
accounts, and to leave out those types of forced labour migration, which are not
conventionally included in work but are covered in international conventions on
forced labour and trafficking. The paper contributors should not be concerned with
other forms of non-labour migration (such as refugee or student migration) or with
population mobility, which is important for an understanding urban growth.
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(k) marriage
(l) migration of parent/earning member of the family and
(m) others.
A simple analysis using vicariate tables has been carried out in the paper to
bring out the extent of employment oriented migration in India. Moreover, the paper
also attempts to study the difference between the stated reasons for migration and the
labor force participation, taking into account duration and educational qualification
of the migrants. Employment oriented migration
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IMPACT OF MIGRATION
ON MIGRANTS AND THEIR FAMILIES
Poorer migrant workers, crowded into the lower ends of the labour market,
have few entitlements vis a vis their employers or the public authorities in the
destination areas. They have meagre personal assets and suffer a range of
deprivations in the destination areas. In the source areas, migration has both negative
and positive consequences for migrants and their families.
LIVING CONDITIONS:
Migrant labourers, whetheragricultural or non-agricultural, live in
deplorableconditions. There is no provision of safe drinking water or hygienic
sanitation. Most live in open spaces or makeshift shelters in spite of the Contract
Labour Act which stipulates that the contractor or employer should provide suitable
accommodation (NCRL, 1991; GVT, 2002; Rani and Shylendra, 2001). Apart from
seasonal workers, workers who migrate to the cities for job live in parks and
pavements. Slum dwellers, who are mostly migrants, stay in deplorable conditions,
with inadequate water and bad drainage. Food costs more for migrant workers who
are not able to obtain temporary ration cards.
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and packed off to foreign destinations. All said and done, this can be considered as a
precursor to the global migration of Indians.
However, there is the problem of Indian embassies in most of these countries
not being very cooperative towards the migrant community. The embassies are not
exactly attuned to the needs of these people, nor are the officials always aware of
their problems, their issues and their needs be it in terms of their labour contracts,
or the laws of the land. There is greater room for the Indian embassies to play a more
effective and cooperative role in this context. Many a time, because of the
indifference and the ignorance of the Indian missions in these countries, the migrant
workers are almost always at the mercy of the employers and the laws that they
adhere to. It is only in recent years that the Government is waking up to the need for
appointing a separate Labour Attach in the Indian embassies in these countries, to
cater to the demands of the workers, and to take care of their needs.
There is the possibility of migration from India growing in the coming years and
decades. The probability of a younger age population in India coupled with declining
birth-rates in the developed world leading to a labour shortage, be it unskilled,
skilled or professional, are among the causes. The interface between outsourcing,
migration and growing social networks are also contributory factors. There is also
the factor of newer destinations, Japan, for instance, emerging on the horizon. In
this, the Indians abroad have transitioned from being dependants to being dictators
through their significant presence, positional clout and numerical strength coupled
with effective networking, and coordinated organisation. There is now the Global
Organization for the People of Indian Origin (GOPIO), which has set its priorities in
pooling resources, both financial and professional, for the benefit of PIOs, in the
countries they come from, and in India. In all this, India derives material support
from the Diaspora, and they derive psychological satisfaction of being a part of the
Indian nationhood, and in the process of crafting a resurgent India.
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EFFECTS OF MIGRATION
Migration of labour has its positive as well as negative effects both on native
and host countries. We will examine these effects as under:
POSITIVE EFFECTS:
1. WAGE RATE:
Labourers usually migrate from low wage counties to higher wage nations. Unless
prevented or guarded by law, wages will change in both countries. Such an effect on
wages is brought out in Home country and foreign. It is also possible that over a
period of time real wages may increase both in host countries and native countries. A
case study by Jeffery G. Williams, of eight countries, host countries Argentina,
Australia, Canada and United States of America and native (home) countries
Ireland, Italy, Norway and Sweden between the period 1870 and 1913 has come to
the conclusion that real wages during this period had increased in all the countries,
but substantially in the home countries.
2. SUPPLY OF LABOUR:
Developed countries like Canada, Australia, some European countries and USA have
experienced scarcity of skilled as well as unskilled labour. Many Asian doctors and
engineers, nurses and teachers are employed in developed countries. Unskilled
labour migrated from developing countries, provided labour to those areas where the
native people would not wish to take up the jobs. This is more evident in the so
called dirty jobs. In USA such jobs are taken up by labourers from Mexico, South
American, Africa and Asia.
3. EMPLOYMENT:
Migration takes place primarily in search of employment, to earn, more income and
to enjoy better quality of life. While enjoying these benefits in the host countries the
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migrants at the disguised unemployment. In the early stages of large scale migration
from Europe to North America, it helped in mitigating population problem of
European countries.
4. REMITTANCE:
Emigrants remit a part of their income back to their families in their native country.
Many of the European countries, Mexico and Asian countries have benefited from
the remittance of their emigrants. At present china and India receive a substantial
amount of remittance. It helps the home countries reduce their balance of payment
problem or increase investment at home; import capital goods thus promote
development of their economies.
Remittance would reduce over a period of time as the emigrants settle in the
migrated country along with their families. The size of the remittance depends on the
number of emigrants from a country and the nature and duration of employment.
Many countries including India, offer additional incentives to the emigrants to remit
and keep the money back in their home country.
NEGATIVE EFFECTS
1. BRAIN DRAIN:
Emigrants comprise people educated and trained at different levels. Majority of the
emigrants are of low education and unskilled. Emigrants also include highly
educated professionals such as doctors, engineers, professors and other technically
and professionally trained people. A good number of medical, engineering and
management students from India migrate to countries like USA, Canada, Australia,
New Zealand, Germany, France and to some rich gulf countries. These students take
the advantage of subsidised education financed by tax payer money and leave the
country when they become productive agents or labourers. Ts is also argued that
educated emigrants help the home countries when these countries rare not in a
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position to employ them. Beside it also reduces the claim on goods and service of the
home country when labourers migrate.
2. PROBLEM OF SOCIAL INTEGRATION:
Immigrants in a country belong to different countries, race, religion and culture.
They form their own groups based on the above factors. In the initial stages these
groups live in ghettoes. Social assimilation with the people of the host country
becomes difficult. In USA, Canada and Australia or in countries dominated by white
coloured people, social integration becomes difficult due to colour complex.
Religion is another factor which makes immigrants identify with the host country
where the majority belong to another religion. Cultural differences also deter the
process of integration specially when each group develops a complex of cultural
superiority. At times ethnic and religious differences create a problem for the host
country as it happens in UK and India.
3. ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS:
It is a serious problem for many countries. USA has a large number of illegal
immigrants from Mexico. Similar problems are faced by Canada, Australia and some
of the European countries. Illegal migration to a neighbouring country is a common
occurrence due to political, economic, social and religious factors. India is facing
such a problem with illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
4. CHEAP LABOUR:
Developed countries, specially organise labour through their Trade Union oppose the
liberal migration policy. They argue that the migrant labourers who are willing to
work at lower workers. However this argument does not merit serious consideration
wage rate in such economies is determined by market forces, Exploitation can be
prevented through minimum wage law, which also safeguards the interest of migrant
labourers.
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5. FISCAL IMBALANCE:
Immigrants positively contribute to the growth of the host country. When
immigrants constitute in large numbers, the host country requires to spend huge
amount of capital to provide the required economic and social infrastructure. As they
settledown permanently, the government requires to spend for providing social
security benefits. Expenditure on all these counts may create fiscal imbalance in the
form of increased budgetary deficit.
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CONCLUSION
Migration has become a global phenomenon. As discussed earlier people
migrate to another country for a number of reasons of which economic and political
are the important ones. From our earlier explanation it is evident that migration has
positive as well as negative effects both on the host and native countries. In a
globalised world, the number of migrants is bound to increase. However in the larger
interest of nations and people (migrants) involved it is necessary to introduce
measures so that the positive effects are maximised while the negative ones are
minimised if they cannot be totally eliminated.
The suggestions in this direction are to promote labour rights to immigrants.
Allow the migrant workers to join Trade Unions. Treat immigrants on the same level
as those of workers of host country. Safety conditions should be made applicable
even if they are on temporary work. Promote ethical recruitment. Prevent
exploitation and discrimination. Reform work permits schemes to reduce powers of
employers. Legislate to prevent employers from withholding migrant workers
passport. Initiate international action to regulate the activities of private recruitment
agencies. All the countries should ratify 1990 UN convention on the protection of
rights of all migrant workers and their families.
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