Thousands join protest against CAA, NRC in Mumbai

New Delhi, Apr 23: The nationwide lockdown in India which started about a month ago has impacted nearly 40 million internal migrants, the World Bank has said.

The lockdown in India has impacted the livelihoods of a large proportion of the country's nearly 40 million internal migrants. Around 50,000 60,000 moved from urban centers to rural areas of origin in the span of a few days, the bank said in a report released on Wednesday.

According to the report -- 'COVID-19 Crisis Through a Migration Lens' -- the magnitude of internal migration is about two-and-a-half times that of international migration.

Lockdowns, loss of employment, and social distancing prompted a chaotic and painful process of mass return for internal migrants in India and many countries in Latin America, it said.

Thus, the COVID-19 containment measures might have contributed to spreading the epidemic, the report said.

Governments need to address the challenges facing internal migrants by including them in health services and cash transfer and other social programmes, and protecting them from discrimination, it said.

World Bank said that coronavirus crisis has affected both international and internal migration in the South Asia region.

As the early phases of the crisis unfolded, many international migrants, especially from the Gulf countries, returned to countries such as India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh until travel restrictions halted these flows.

Some migrants had to be evacuated by governments, such as those of China and Iran, it said.

Before the coronavirus crisis, migrant outflows from the region were robust, the report said.

The number of recorded, primarily low-skilled emigrants from India and Pakistan rose in 2019 relative to the prior year but is expected to decline in 2020 due to the pandemic and oil price declines impacting the Gulf countries.

In India, the number of low-skilled emigrants seeking mandatory clearance for emigration rose slightly by eight percent to 368,048 in 2019.

In Pakistan, the number of emigrants jumped 63 per cent to 6,25,203 in 2019, largely due to a doubling of emigration to Saudi Arabia, it said.

According to the bank, migration flows are likely to fall, but the stock of international migrants may not decrease immediately, since migrants cannot return to their countries due to travel bans and disruption to transportation services.

In 2019, there were around 272 million international migrants.

The rate of voluntary return migration is likely to fall, except in the case of a few cross-border migration corridors in the South (such as Venezuela-Colombia, Nepal-India, Zimbabwe South Africa, Myanmar-Thailand), it said.

Migrant workers tend to be vulnerable to the loss of employment and wages during an economic crisis in their host country, more so than native-born workers.

Lockdowns in labour camps and dormitories can also increase the risk of contagion among migrant workers.

Many migrants have been stranded due to the suspension of transport services. Some host countries have granted visa extensions and temporary amnesty to migrant workers, and some have suspended the involuntary return of migrants, it said.

Observing that government policy responses to the COVID-19 crisis have largely excluded migrants and their families back home, the World Bank said there is a strong case for including migrants in the near-term health strategies of all countries, given the externalities associated with the health status of an entire population in the face of a highly contagious pandemic.

The Bank said governments would do well to consider short, medium and long-term interventions to support stranded migrants, remittance infrastructure, loss of subsistence income for families back home, and access to health, housing, education, and jobs for migrant workers in host/transit countries and their families back home.

The pandemic has also highlighted the global shortage of health professionals and an urgent need for global cooperation and long-term investments in medical training, it said.

New Delhi, Jun 18: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said he is "deeply grateful" for the overwhelming support shown by the global community for India''s membership of the UN Security Council.

India will work with all member countries to promote global peace, security, resilience and equity, he said.

India garnered 184 votes out of the 192 ballots cast in the General Assembly to win the election for the non-permanent seat in the powerful Security Council.

India''s two year term will begin on January 1, 2021.

This is the eighth time that India will sit at the UN high-table, which comprises five permanent members and 10 non-permanent members.

"Deeply grateful for the overwhelming support shown by the global community for India''s membership of the UN Security Council," the prime minister wrote on Twitter.

India will work with all member countries to promote global peace, security, resilience and equity, he said.

New Delhi, Mar 20: Bodies of the four Nirbhaya convicts who were hanged on Friday morning at Tihar Jail have been sent to hospital for a post-mortem, following which it will be handed over to the families, according to an official.

After the hanging at 5:30 am today, the bodies were taken from Tihar Jail to Deen Dayal Upadhyay (DDU) Hospital for post mortem at around 8:20 am.

Tihar jail Director-General Sandeep Goel said that the bodies will be handed over to the families after the post mortem.

The families, however, will have to give a written undertaking that they will not make a public demonstration of the cremation or burial of the executed person.

The superintendent will also consult the District Magistrate and the Deputy Commissioner of Police for arrangements for the disposal of the body.

The post mortem comes in line with the Supreme Court's order in Shatrughan Chauhan's case in January 2014, which had mandated the same observing that there is a dearth of experienced hangman in the country.

"By making the performance of post mortem obligatory, the cause of the death of the convict can be found out, which will reveal whether the person died as a result of the dislocation of the cervical vertebrate or by strangulation which results on account of too long a drop," the apex court had said in its order.

"Our constitution permits the execution of death sentence only through the procedure established by law and this procedure must be just, fair and reasonable," the order added.

All four convicts in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case -- Akshay Singh Thakur, Pawan Gupta, Vinay Sharma, and Mukesh Singh -- were hanged till death at 5:30 am this morning.

The case pertains to the brutal gang-rape and killing of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in the national capital. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later.

One of the adults accused had allegedly committed suicide in the prison during the trial, while the juvenile was released from a correction home after a period of three years.