Why so many Biharis still work as labourers in Tamil Nadu?
A few days ago, false films that claimed migrant workers from bihar were being attacked in tamil Nadu appeared on social media, causing alarm and a brief evacuation of some of the labor. A brief examination revealed that the events shown in the images had already occurred, some of them even outside of tamil Nadu. The police reported incidents, made several arrests for disseminating false information, and asked the biggest social media platforms to contain the damage.
Senior bihar officials also travelled to the southern state where they met with other officials and migrant labour representatives. It was necessary for both chief ministers to deliver "everything is well" remarks and a call for peace. But, the concern has brought up an old issue: Why are thousands of Bihari labourers still have to leave their homes and toil in punjab, tamil Nadu, and other states? especially after years of the chief minister Nitish Kumar's purported sushasan (excellent administration).
The short explanation is that bihar had the highest unemployment rate in the nation when nitish kumar assumed office in 2005. He pledged to alter the situation and prevent Biharis from leaving the area in search of employment. Just rajasthan and Jammu & kashmir were in its way in 2022. Around 15 lakh employees fled frantically for their homes during the 2020 Covid-19 outbreak, bringing the scope of Bihar's migratory dilemma into the public eye.
In bihar, the poverty rate was 54.5% in 2005. It was the nation's poorest state. In his campaign, nitish kumar pledged to end poverty. Today's poorest state is still Bihar. 51.9 percent of people live in poverty. More than half of the population of bihar is multidimensionally poor, according to an niti aayog research. Data from the Centre for Monitoring indian Economy (CMIE) show that Bihar's unemployment rate increased to 12.3% in february 2023, while the national rate was 7.5%. States like rajasthan, Jharkhand, and haryana, however, performed worse than Bihar.
Young men with little or no education were compelled to leave their homes and find work as farm labourers, sanitation and construction workers, hawkers, watchmen, dhobis, rickshaw pullers, auto-rickshaw drivers, and, most recently, elevator attendants. Together with populous states like Uttar Pradesh, bihar had a surplus of labour for expanding states like punjab and haryana or industrially-minded states like Maharashtra, Gujarat, tamil Nadu, and Karnataka. Before that, job seekers were drawn in large numbers to Kolkata.
There was hope when nitish kumar took office in 2005. Suhasan received a lot of media attention, but little changed. Large areas of land continue to be destroyed by monsoon-swollen rivers, and unemployment is still a serious socio-political problem. This is true despite and as a result of his gradual power-sharing arrangements with Lalu Yadav's RJD and prime minister Narendra Modi's BJP.
The bihar government is working hard to create opportunities for people today, but it isn't making plans for the youngsters of today who will need employment in a few years. This is one of the contributing factors to our enormous backlogs. The planning that is currently being done by the government should have been done years ago. It makes sense that some of the well-known images coming out of bihar are of young people who are looking for work torching trains or being beaten by the police. Alternatively, migrant labourers may flee for safety at the first sign of alarm.