Why these 'missing' migrant voters have little to lose this election

As an Aam Aadmi Party padyatra (rally) crosses a tiny lane of swarming houses that stand cheek by jowl in South Delhi’s Dakshinpuri, Sanatan Halder emerges from a mound of garbage inside a litter bin. His hands and clothes are soiled. Halder smiles to himself looking at the election rally passing by.

A Bengali migrant, Halder earns his livelihood as a ragpicker in Delhi and loves to talk about politics. He hollers at a resident standing at a distance with a plastic bag stuffed with trash in his hands. “Who is winning this time?” Halder enquires innocuously. The gentleman avoids answering and instead tosses the plastic bag into the bin and disappears. Of course, he misses the target and the bag falls with a thud next to Halder. The contents inside it splatter on the ground. Halder cries out, “aaey, aaey bhaiyya”, and eventually starts picking up the waste.

Halder is one of the 139 million internal migrants in India who live and work in various big and small cities across India. But not all of them can ‘afford’ to take part in the ongoing elections. “I do have a voter ID but from my native village in West Bengal’s Nadia district. So for me, Delhi elections are like a New Zealand-South Africa cricket match. I don’t have anything to lose, no matter who wins. But I still like to know who is contesting,” he says, adding that he doesn’t know the contestants other than AAP candidate Raghav Chadha, who is often seen in the area.

In nearby Sangam Vihar, where Halder lives in an unauthorised colony, there are a number of Bengali migrants like him who still don’t count as Delhi voters. “I have been living here for 20 years now, but I didn’t get myself enrolled in Delhi’s electoral roll hoping that someday when I go back I’ll vote from Bengal. But it seems that will never happen.” Halder tells The Federal that he had been to Bengal to cast his vote twice in all these years during local bodies elections. “Gram panchayat agents do call us to come during elections but how can I afford to go all the way just to make someone win who is not even going to work for me?” As an afterthought, he adds, “I think I should get my voter ID from Delhi. I have heard these days there is less jhamela (paper work) required to get enrolled.”

Halder was talking about the process that the Election Commission of India has in place, both online (Form 6) and in-office, through which voters of a constituency who are settled outside could get themselves enrolled at the place they live and vote from their current address. Their names will, however, be deleted from the previous electoral roll.

Process and polls

But this is not an easy process. Activists working in the field say the procedure is cumbersome and there are no fixed timelines for the process of transfer of an applicant’s name to another constituency. The appeal mechanism is not user-friendly. Moreover, how many people like Halder know about it or have the patience and time to run around offices?

Every year, Indian states see a huge number of people, mostly from rural areas, relocating to bigger cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Kolkata looking for work. A large number of them also migrate for college education or jobs in multinationals. Most of the labour migrants are engaged in construction and domestic work, transportation, brick manufacturing, mining, quarrying etc.

Money matters

Even though many migrants, especially in Delhi, have become an important vote bank for mainstream political parties, but this doesn’t necessarily mean all those living and working vote from here. “During the last elections, party workers came and helped everyone get their voter IDs. Polling agents from across all parties come and do that. They know each vote counts,” says Amit Kumar, 26, from Bihar’s Sasaram. Kumar, now a registered voter from Delhi, has been in the capital preparing for competitive exams for the past six years.

But not everybody, according to 30-year-old Ranju Devi, is able to get enrolled in the electoral rolls here. “I came here after my marriage but my identity proofs are from Bihar like ration card, Aadhaar card, BPL card etc,” says Ranju, who works as a maid at flats in a gated apartment complex. She says she could never avail benefits like subsidised rice, wheat and kerosene through ration card ever since she left her native village in Bihar’s Chapra.

Ranju also cites similar problems as Halder for not going to cast her vote this time. “If I go to Bihar, I’ll end up losing at least 10-15 days’ salary. Even if those party people, who have been calling me, pay my train fare, who would pay the rent here?” she questions, adding that polling agents from various parties often try to coerce them in letting someone else from the family cast the vote on their behalf.

“Also, what would I get if I vote from Bihar. I live here and the problems I face here can be solved by the local neta only. But then I have no say here,” she smiles.

It’s not just the lack of personal interest – something that has been perceived and termed as voter apathy – that keeps many migrants away from elections. Apart from expensive travel fares and the added discomfort, what make matters worse are problems like absence of paid leaves, especially for people like Ranju.

Even the middle-class migrants face similar challenges.

“I couldn’t go to home to cast my vote this time. I wanted to but the flight charges were too high. I can’t spend my hard-earned money on such expensive air tickets to go for a day. Also, getting long leaves is always a problem in my office,” says Juanita Ete, who works at a beauty salon in Delhi. Ete, a native of Pasighat in Arunachal Pradesh, takes at least 40 hours to reach home from Delhi, if not travelling by air.

According to a study by Patna-based AN Sinha Institute of Social Studies (ANSISS) on ‘Voters’ Behaviour’, elections conducted during October and November (festival season) witness high voting percentage.

For instance, the Assembly polls held in mid-October to early November in 2015 saw a high voting percentage. This, experts say, may have been a result of the fact that a lot of people from the state came home during the festive season and also decided to cast their votes.

A third section of migrants include the seasonal migrants who don’t figure anywhere in modern town planning and the popular imagination of urbanisation. They are the ones engaged in low-paying and hazardous jobs such as construction work, industrial manufacturing, hotels and transportation etc., that are part of high-stakes development plans for cities.

The irony of it is that most such migrants who are forced to leave their native places for a better life remain stuck in the lowest-paying jobs in their new places of residence.

Loss of dignity, and sometimes life

“I used to sell fish back home but my partner duped me and took away everything. I was forced to leave home and come here through a friend who was already living in Delhi,” Halder says, adding that no one in his family back home has done this job [rag-picking] ever.

“Moreover, when people like us fall ill we often don’t have enough money for treatment. Even a test through Mohalla Clinic [neighbourhood clinics in Delhi that provide primary healthcare with essential medicines and 212 diagnostic tests free of cost] requires an Aadhaar card. Last month, my friend had to go back to Bengal. He would cough all day long. We still don’t know what was he suffering from but he died last week.”

The lack of local identity cards also means no access to basic entitlements and social benefits like subsidised food, fuel, health services, or education that are meant for the economically vulnerable sections of the population.

Both Ranju and Halder strongly feel that because of their lack of voting rights from Delhi they are often unable to raise political demands for social entitlements.

“Politics has no place for non-voters,” Ranju says, pointing at the complex intersection of local identity politics and migration, which she obviously doesn’t know how to define.

In Delhi, all three main political parties – BJP, Congress and Aam Aadmi Party – are competing for the Purvanchali migrant votes in this Lok Sabha elections. However, many among the vote bank feel “used” by political parties who remember them only during elections.

For example, back in 2012, then chief minister Sheila Dikshit blamed the burgeoning migrant population for putting existing infrastructure under strain. This time around, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, while making a case for “full statehood”, among other promises, says if Delhi becomes a state, then his government will be able to open more colleges and universities and will reserve 85 per cent of seats in colleges for Delhi-based students (this includes anyone passing Class XII from Delhi).

“Although he says students from outside Delhi are most welcome, they end up occupying most seats in universities. So, Delhi needs more colleges and universities. Fair enough! But somehow when he says ‘humare Dilli ke bachche (our Delhi children)’ it reeks of a negative feeling about students from outside the state,” says Arunima, a BA second-year student who hails from Jorhat in Assam.

But then such statements and ‘slip-ups’ don’t matter to the migrant labourers. “We don’t have much sentiments. So, we don’t get hurt so easily. But yes, it would have been nice if I too could vote from here. They [politicians] would have come to me as well asking for my vote,” smiles Halder.

Ask him why and he says, “Bhalo lage (it feels important).”