Stay safe at home. We have strengthened our online platforms with an aim to serve your needs uniterruptedly. Access our websites: www.nipponindiamf.com www.nipponindiapms.com (Chat feature available) www.nipponindiaetf.com www.nipponindiaaif.com Click to download our mobile apps: Nippon India Mutual Fund | Simply Save App For any further queries, contact us at [email protected] Mutual Fund investments are subject to market risks, read all scheme related documents carefully. INDIA-CHINA: TENSION PEAKS IN LADAKH DIGITAL ISSUE www.outlookindia.com June 8, 2020 What After Home? Lakhs of migrants have returned to their villages. OUTLOOK tracks them to find out what lies ahead. Mohammad Saiyub’s friend Amrit Kumar died on their long journey home. Right, Saiyub in his village Devari in UP. RNI NO. 7044/1961 MANAGING EDITOR, OUTLOOK FROM THE EDITOR Returning to RUBEN BANERJEE the Returnees EDITOR IN CHIEF and apathy have been their constant companions since then. As entire families—the old, infirm and the ailing included—attempt to plod back home, they have been sub- NDIA is working from home; jected to ill-treatment and untold indignities by the police Bharat is walking home—the short for violating the lockdown. Humiliation after humiliation tweet by a friend summing up was heaped upon them endlessly as they walked, cycled and what we, as a locked-down nation, hitchhiked long distances. They were sprayed with disin- have been witnessing over the past fectants and fleeced by greedy transporters for painful two months was definitely smart. rides on the back of trucks and tempos. When they thronged The wordplay was interesting and railway stations and bus terminals in a mad rush for a seat, impressive. But I am not too sure if they were almost always treated like cattle. It was truly I it was still adequate to encapsulate colossal the way a callous system failed them. the scale of a disaster that has befallen mil- The collective outrage over how badly the migrants were lions of migrants frantically attempting to let down has been equally huge. Though those in the gov- reach home in distant towns and villages ernment may still be in denial and reluctant to acknowl- that lie beyond urban India. We have not edge the tragedy, there has been no dearth of debates and seen this in our living memory—certainly discussions on the migrants and their plight. not since Partition. It is not easy to fathom Among the defining images of the agonising lockdown the misery that the profusely sweating and has been that of Ram Pukar Pandit from Bihar’s Begusarai mostly starving mass of people find them- weeping inconsolably on the phone upon hearing his child’s selves in. I, for one, am at a loss for words in death as he attempted to return home; or that of Moham- trying to articulate their tragedy. mad Saiyub, a migrant worker from Uttar Pradesh, whose What I can safely presume, though, is friend Amrit Kumar died in the middle of their arduous that their sufferings are manifold more trek. Their stories have seared our heart. They have even than our middle-class angst. As the touched an emotional chord in distant places. US President migrants trudge home, they are negotiat- Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka tweeted recently about ing unthinkable odds. The absence of the indomitable spirit of a young Bihar girl who tirelessly proper transport is simply appalling. cycled more than a 1,000 km to carry her ailing father home. Cocooned inside our urban comforts, we It is but natural that the migrants’ march, with its atten- have been forced at the most to change dant struggle, is hogging the headlines. our daily routines. Though our own But we would be failing them all over again if we forget future looks uncertain amid job cuts and them now. For the likes of Pandit and Saiyub who have mounting economic losses, COVID-19 finally reached home, a more uphill struggle to survive awaits, has not yet exacted any toll other than minus assured livelihood. Though the media’s attention span primarily confining us to our homes. In is notoriously limited, Outlook does not give up on a story mid- comparison, the migrants are battling to way and several of my colleagues—Salik Ahmed, Giridhar Jha, survive in the open, braving hunger, heat, Sandeep Sahu, G.C. Sekhar, Suresh Kumar Pandey and Sandi- and intermittent police high-handedness. pan Chatterjee—displayed exemplary enterprise to reach out What is inexplicable is the way they to the migrants in their villages. This issue’s cover story is a have been left in the lurch. A hurriedly reminder of the challenges that the returnees face, and our enforced lockdown left them without collective responsibility towards them. money and work. Soon, they ran out of food and were forced to seek the per- ceived safety of homes in the back of beyond they were born into. Insensitivity (Ruben Banerjee) OUTLOOKINDIA.COM JUNE 8, 2020 | OUTLOOK 3 ‹ N A V I G A T O R › SURESH K. PANDEY EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Ruben Banerjee MANAGING EDITOR Sunil Menon EXECUTIVE EDITOR Satish Padmanabhan FOREIGN EDITOR Pranay Sharma POLITICAL EDITOR Bhavna Vij-Aurora SENIOR EDITOR Giridhar Jha (Mumbai) CHIEF ART DIRECTOR Deepak Sharma WRITERS Lola Nayar, Qaiser Mohammad Ali (Senior Associate Editors), G.C. Shekhar (Associate Editor), Jeevan Prakash Sharma (Senior Assistant Editor), Ajay Sukumaran, Puneet Nicholas Yadav, Jyotika Sood, Lachmi Deb Roy (Assistant Editors), Naseer Ganai (Senior Special Correspondent), Preetha Nair (Special Correspondent), Salik Ahmad (Senior Correspondent) COPY DESK Rituparna Kakoty (Senior Associate Editor), Anupam Bordoloi, Saikat Niyogi, Satyadeep (Associate Editors), Syed Saad Ahmed (Assistant Editor) PHOTOGRAPHERS S. Rakshit (Chief Photo Coordinator), Jitender Gupta (Photo Editor), Tribhuvan Tiwari (Deputy Photo Editor), Sandipan Chatterjee, Apoorva Salkade (Sr Photographers), Suresh Kumar Pandey (Staff Photographer) J.S. Adhikari (Sr Photo Researcher), U. Suresh Kumar (Digital Library) DESIGN Saji C.S. (Chief Designer), Leela (Senior Designer), Devi Prasad, Padam Gupta (Sr DTP Operators) DIGITAL Neha Mahajan (Associate Editor), Soumitra Mishra (Digital Consultant), Jayanta Oinam (Assistant Editor), Mirza Arif Beg (Special Correspondent), Neelav Chakravarti (Senior Correspondent), Charupadma Pati (Trainee Journalist), Suraj Wadhwa (Chief Graphic Designer), Editorial Manager & Chief Librarian Alka Gupta BUSINESS OFFICE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER Indranil Roy PUBLISHER Sandip Kumar Ghosh SR VICE PRESIDENT Meenakshi Akash VICE PRESIDENTS Shrutika Dewan, Diwan Singh Bisht SR GENERAL MANAGERS Kabir Khattar (Corp), COVER STORY Debabani Tagore, Shailender Vohra 30 GENERAL MANAGERS Sasidharan Kollery, Shashank Dixit Millions of bedraggled migrants marched their way CHIEF MANAGER Shekhar Kumar Pandey MANAGERS Shekhar Suvarana, Sudha Sharma back from the cities to their villages. Outlook caught CIRCULATION & SUBSCRIPTION Anindya Banerjee, Gagan Kohli, G. Ramesh (South), up with some of them at their homes...to know their Vinod Kumar (North), Arun Kumar Jha (East) DIGITAL Amit Mishra stories, to know their plans for the future. HEAD OFFICE AB-10, S.J. Enclave, New Delhi - 110 029 Tel: 011-71280400; Fax: 26191420 Customer care helpline: 011-71280433, 71280462, 71280307 e-mail: [email protected] For editorial queries: [email protected] For subscription helpline: [email protected] 14 | BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED PASSES 10 POLIGLOT OTHER OFFICES MUMBAI Tel: 022-50990990 How will aggressive posturing and transgres- 62 BOOKS CALCUTTA Tel: 033 46004506; Fax: 033 46004506 sions along the Line of Actual Control impact 64 AUDI 5 CHENNAI Tel: 42615224, 42615225; Fax: 42615095 BANGALORE Tel: 080-43715021 India-China relations? 66 LA DOLCE VITA Printed and published by Indranil Roy on behalf of Outlook Publishing (India) Pvt. Ltd. 69 DIARY Editor: Ruben Banerjee. Printed at Kalajyothi 56 | OPENCAST CANOPY Process Pvt. Ltd. Sy.No.185, Sai Pruthvi Enclave, Kondapur – 500 084, R.R.Dist. Telangana and Coal India Limited has been mining in the published from AB-10, S.J. Enclave, Dehing Patkai Wildlife Sanctuary since New Delhi-110 029 2003. As it seeks further clearances, Cover Design: Total no. of pages 70, Including Covers opposition intensifies. Deepak Sharma Subscription Copy Not For Resale BIG BANKS—GOOD OR BAD?—see page 72 The firsT OuTlOOk MOney - POlicyBazaar insurance ranking pg 32 आउटलुक-आइसीएआरई इंडिया यूडिवडसटी रℂडकंग 2019 RAKHIGARHI RIDDLE WHAT DOES THE DNA TELL US? DELENG/2006/16808 RNI NO. 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