-The Indian Express With small land-holdings, hilly terrains, water scarcity and parched lands, farming is neither profitable nor a dependable source of income in many villages. Dahod: The ardous journey is not just what migrant labourers, who are returning in thousands from Cities to their villages amid an unprecedented nation wide lockdown in view of the coronavirus pandemic, are facing. Deeper economic uncertainties stare at many of them back in their villages. Sukhlal...

-The Indian Express As the national lockdown entered its second week, The Indian Express travelled across four states to track this unprecedented exodus, examine what social distancing and isolation means in towns and villages off camera and off the highway — and what could await the first COVID-19 patients here. Morena (Madhya Pradesh): They built homes, offices, even Cities. They worked in technology companies. They cooked the food we ate, cleaned the...

-The Indian Express Ranveer was one among the countless migrant workers walking home from big Cities to their villages, where new rules of isolation and quarantine await. And his story is emblematic of their plight, and the trauma of waiting families. Morena (Madhya Pradesh): The audio file is 42 seconds long. On one end is a loud, animated voice. Screaming, beseeching. “Ask someone to give you a lift till Morena. Hello? Hello?”...

-The Hindu In dealing with the crisis, the Centre should not only learn from States but also act on its own In dealing with the health and economic crisis, the Central government’s apathy is disappointing. The Prime Minister’s speech created panic even for the well-off. For the most vulnerable, it triggered a huge exodus from the Cities. They were given neither time to prepare for the unplanned lockdown nor support to cope...

-Scroll.in One man suffered a heart attack while walking along the Agra highway. Some others, including children, were killed in road accidents. Thousands of migrant workers have been trying to get home, with many of them attempting to cross state borders, amid the 21-day lockdown imposed to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. Many of them have died. While the deaths of at least 22 such migrants are documented, the actual...