Chandigarh, September 18: In Punjab’s bustling grain markets, the start of the paddy procurement season usually brings relief and anticipation for thousands of migrant workers who travel from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar each year. This season, however, is shadowed by fear. The brutal killing of a five-year-old boy in Hoshiarpur on September 9, allegedly by a migrant labourer from UP, has unleashed a wave of anger and suspicion that now threatens to unsettle Punjab’s reliance on its migrant workforce.
For Pappu Kumar Yadav of Purnia, Bihar, who has been coming to Punjab for 15 years with a group of nearly 200 workers, the mood feels starkly different this time. “Each year, we earn around Rs 40,000 in a month by working here — four times what we make back home. But after the Hoshiarpur murder, a wave of hostility has spread against ‘pravasi mazdoors.’ We now live in constant fear as the hatred can easily spread beyond the city where the crime took place,” he says, while unloading sacks at Khanna, Asia’s largest grain market. Some of his companions are even weighing the option of leaving Punjab before the harvest season ends.
The ripple effects of the crime have extended far beyond Hoshiarpur. Local panchayats in at least 20 villages there, as well as others in adjoining districts, have passed resolutions against undocumented migrants. Reports suggest that panchayats in Malerkotla, Ropar, Nawanshahr and Mohali are also considering similar measures. Adding to the unease, self-styled vigilantes have issued threats to migrants, demanding they leave.
Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, aware of the tensions, condemned the murder but urged against vilifying workers from outside the state. “Anyone can work anywhere in the country,” he noted, attempting to quell rising animosity.
Industry leaders, traders and farmers have been quick to underline Punjab’s dependence on migrant labour. “There are more than 18 lakh migrant workers in Punjab, employed across industries, farms, shops and homes. The state’s economy is progressing because of them. Such hostility will drive them away,” warns Badish Jindal, president of the World MSME Forum, in a letter to the Chief Minister.
Commission agents and farmers in Khanna insist they are standing by the workers. “Though some miscreants have been trying to create a divide, we have assured the labourers of protection. Ehna to bina Punjab di gaddi nahin chaldi (Punjab cannot do without them),” says Harbans Singh Rosha, a commission agent. In Amritsar, Kamal Dalmia of the Focal Point Industrial Welfare Association points out that “over 90 per cent of the labour in any industry comes either from UP or Bihar. Migrants are the backbone of Punjab’s economy.” Farmers like Gurbakshish Singh from Nabha echo the same sentiment, stressing that paddy transplantation and harvesting would be unimaginable without them.
Behind the scenes, officials admit that the growing hostility has been partly fueled by vigilante groups. A senior IAS officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, explains, “Self-styled vigilantes approached the district administrations with memorandums demanding that migrants be sent back. The demand found resonance with some aggrieved parties, following which panchayats passed resolutions calling for their ouster.”
But many in Punjab’s industrial sector have tried to reassure migrants that the hostility is not widespread. Ludhiana industrialist Gurmeet Singh Kular insists workers are safe in the state. “Some of the migrant workers have been in Punjab for four generations. They are as much Punjabi as we are. In Ludhiana, we provide them free housing, good salaries and best working conditions,” he says.
Stories of long-standing integration support that claim. TR Mishra, who migrated to Punjab six decades ago and now runs a boiler manufacturing business in Ludhiana, calls the fear campaign manufactured. “Certain anti-social elements appear to be trying to instil fear among migrants, probably to vitiate harmony. But I am proof of integration into society here and the acceptance shown by Punjabis,” he says, urging current workers to stay put.
As Punjab’s markets hum with the arrival of freshly harvested grain, the anxiety among its workforce is palpable. For the state’s farmers and industries, the stakes are clear: without migrant hands, the harvest and the economy would falter. For the workers, the challenge is whether assurances of safety will outweigh the fear sparked by a single crime and its aftermath.
