For India’s Laborers, Coronavirus Lockdown Is an Order to Starve

Despite leaders’ decrees on staying home, laborers who live hand-to-mouth say they have no choice but to keep hitting the streets.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has ordered a lockdown of India’s 1.3 billion citizens to fight the spread of coronavirus, urging people to distance themselves socially and work from home.

But social distancing means hunger for many in India, with a work force heavily dependent on manual labor. It would be an unheard-of luxury for the ragpicker or street vendor who lives day to day.

About 80 percent of India’s 470 million workers are in the informal sector, lacking contracts and unprotected by labor laws. Many are manual laborers in the fields, factories and streets of India.