Low-skilled Indian construction workers in the Gulf, Singapore and Malaysia Return to India, reintegration and re-emigration

Abstract

Abstract The global economic crisis has created a context in which return of low- and unskilled migrant workers has increased in pace and amount. South Indians, who have formed an important labor source for the construction sectors in the Gulf and South-East Asia for decades, are among the most severely hit. The goal of this study has been to examine what happens with the labor migrants after return, i.e. their reintegration patterns and their propensity to re-emigrate, and what policies exist to assist them. The most important fieldwork data were gathered through a survey among 143 return migrants in different locations in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. Furthermore, several interviews with key informants, phone calls with the return migrants and document study provided additional qualitative data. Results showed that the period after return is greatly influenced by the preliminary phases of the migration project, starting with initial recruitment and social influence and pressure from within the home community. In these preliminary phases the success or failure of a migration project is already largely determined. These factors are therefore also of crucial importance in explaining reintegration patterns or the propensity to re-emigrate. It is not uncommon that migrants get exploited during the whole process of migration, eventually leading to problems back in India that hinder reintegration. Many returnees have to cope with debt problems, sometimes so heavy that they are apparently unsolvable. However, not everybody truly tries to reintegrate, since a lot of returnees have the wish to emigrate again. Migration is for many migrants a continuum and does not stop with the first return to India. This re-emigration can be an additional mission for sufficient resource mobilization, or an ultimate effort to solve the financial problems that have been piling up since migration was started. Policies for return migrants hardly exist, although the state of Kerala does have extensive programs for migrants and provides its returnees with welfare and pension schemes.