Return migrants and the first wave of COVID-19: Results from the Vande Bharat returnees in Kerala

ABSTRACT

The outbreak of deadly disease coronavirus has spread contagiously throughout the world and disrupted the life and livelihood of billions of people. To control the transmission of the virus, most of the countries have imposed travel restrictions and called for a nationwide lockdown. The most vulnerable section of the society that has been hit hard by the pandemic has been the migrant (internal and international) and their families. Many scholars have referred to the situation among the internal migrants as marginalized and rendering them being stateless, further exposed to a world of infections, insecurity and humiliations. Parallelly, the impact of COVID-19 on return emigrants remains unexplored. In lieu, our study using data from the return emigrant COVID-19 survey from Kerala aims to investigate the socio-economic consequences of COVID-19 pandemic on the return emigrants and their left-behind households (LBHs). © 2022 selection and editorial matter, S. Irudaya Rajan;individual chapters, the contributors.