-The Hindu Blames ‘fake’ online messages for the panic The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) told the Supreme Court on Tuesday that the 21-day national lockdown was “inevitable” in the face of an “unprecedented global crisis” like COVID-19. The government blamed “fake and misleading” messages on social media about COVID-19 for creating widespread panic, which led to mass “barefoot” journey of migrant workers from cities to their native villages. Please click here to...

-Business Standard Most mandis are arranging for the safety of their workers, including load-bearers. Arrivals and supplies are being regulated to maintain flow and avoid crowding Agricultural mandis in many parts of the country have started going operational a week after the nationwide lockdown was implemented, but the process is gradual and disruption persists in some centres. Most mandis are arranging for the safety of their workers, including mathadis (Load-bearers). Arrivals and...

-RuralIndiaOnline.org With the COVID-19 driven lockdown, Chenakonda Balasami and other pastoralists in Telangana, on the road for months, are finding it difficult to access food and new grazing grounds – or return to their villages Nalgonda, Telangana: “How are you? What are you doing? How many days is this going to last?” Chenakonda Balasami asks his son on the phone. “Is it that extreme? Are police there at our place? Are people...

-The Indian Express Invisible, largely, in the Census and in national sample surveys — and consequently to administrators — field studies have consistently claimed short-term labour mobility in India was significant. Of the many, many countries that COVID has now locked down, India stands, or rather, walks, alone. Bereft of transport, by road or rail, people are walking home, to nearby districts, and to far-off destinations several hundred kilometres away, the mother...

-The Hindu While some can practise social distancing, most Indians simply cannot as they have no social security What could possibly have been the reason for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to give only a four-hour notice for the lockdown? If the requirement was to keep the population indoors, strictly enforcing social distancing, how abjectly this has failed! Lakhs of migrant labourers have been jostling to get any form of transport back home;...