Chennai: The essence of the old Tamil adage “Vandharai Vazha Vaikkum Tamizhagam” (Tamil Nadu provides livelihood to anyone who enters the state) may slowly be fading, with the fear of job loss to migrants gripping those from the state.
A video clip of a railway job aspirant from a village in Tamil Nadu, talking about his disbelief at the huge turnout of candidates purportedly from north India at the railway recruitment board exam held in Chennai on 19 January went viral within minutes after it was uploaded on YouTube the same day, garnering 12,000 views.
In the video, the youth is seen describing his experience at the physical examination. “I was shocked, I was thinking if this was still Tamil Nadu or if I had reached some place like Uttar Pradesh. North Indians have fully hijacked the place,” he is heard saying.
The same day several videos were circulated on Whatsapp groups showing a crowd, purportedly of migrants from across the country, who had lined up outside the Tamil Nadu Special Police Force Training Ground in Avadi to attend the physical examination test.
One of the posts circulated on WhatsApp groups read, “Of every 100 candidates in the fitness test, only 5 were from Tamil Nadu.”
The video and WhatsApp comments are only the latest in a series of such public statements voicing concern about migrants taking away opportunities from the local workforce in Tamil Nadu. From the working class to the political class, people from every walk of life have been vocal on the migrant issue.
A month back another video clip of purported migrants walking down a platform in Chennai Central railway station in Tamil Nadu went viral. The voiceover alleged, “The entry of migrants into our state is a threat to Tamil Nadu and Tamils. Without much delay everyone here will realise the same.”
According to a Press Information Bureau (PIB) report published in April 2022, based on the 2011 census, there are over 34.87 lakh migrant labourers in the state and of this 7.13 lakh are women.
“There are so many educated unemployed lot in the state. Unlike some states which have government orders giving preferences to locals, in Tamil Nadu an antagonism is growing because this is not happening and a whole lot of people are taking away these opportunities,” claimed R Geeta, advisor to Unorganised Workers Federation and all India additional secretary of Nirman Mazdoor Panchayat Sangam.
“It was during the former All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) regime that a government order was amended, allowing people from outside Tamil Nadu to get state and central jobs here,” she added.
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Political jibes using migrant reference
Statements by the political class have added to the migrant controversy in the state.
A few days ago, R.S. Bharati, organisational secretary of the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) in the state, compared Governor R.N. Ravi with a migrant labourer from Bihar. “I had earlier stated that those who sell soan papdi and pani puri don’t know the pride of Tamil Nadu… I came to know that many have come from Bihar and I think the Governor has come by a similar train,” Bharati said.
Decrying attempts of Hindi imposition, Tamil Nadu Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudy had last May remarked, “They used to say that if you study Hindi, you’ll get jobs? Is it so! You can see in Coimbatore who are selling pani puri now?”
Migrant labourers have been getting steady work in the state with many private companies seeing them as reliable, said Chandraprasad V.B., a business development manager from the state. He added that the pros are that they are hardworking, ready to work longer hours and more affordable labour.
“The only con is to get accurate verification of the identity of these labourers. Police verification and other government-advised measures have to be taken to ensure that the labourers hired are genuine. Unfortunately, these days people easily get fake IDs,” Chandraprasad further said.
Most of the workers who come from states such as Assam, West Bengal, Meghalaya, Odisha, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan are engaged in labour-intensive work like construction, textile and even traditional work like fishing and agriculture.
With employers preferring to use “guest workers”, resistance to them from locals has also been increasing. In October 2022, in the district of Karur, textile workers had gone on a protest demanding that local labour be put to use over migrant north Indian population.
Specific groups spreading anti-migration
While several issues like anti-Hindi imposition and Tamil pride have taken centre stage in Tamil Nadu in recent months, activists who work with migrant labourers in the state say there are specific groups which are involved in the anti-migrant movement too.
“The state of Tamil Nadu does not have a past where there is xenophobic or anti-migrant trend. It could be work of a certain specific faction,” said Vanessa Peter, Founder, Information and Resource Centre for the Deprived Urban Communities.
Balasubramanian, member, All India Central Council of Trade Unions (AICCTU) said: “There are people who in the name of Tamil patriotism try to propagate this kind of thought process, they have no connection to any labourers or labour unions.”
In October 2021, an ally of the ruling DMK — Tamizhaga Vazhvurimai Katchi (TVK) leader and MLA T. Velmurugan — called for a permit system to be introduced for migrant workers and sort the state’s intervention to ensure that migrant workers do not take away jobs meant for native Tamils. The increasing minorities will push the regional parties behind, he said.
Former AIADMK Minister Ma Foi K. Pandiarajan, who is now in Human Resource (HR) business, talking about the concerns of political groups in the state, said, “About 25 to 30 lakh migrant labourers are in Tamil Nadu and it could change the nature of the narrative of Tamil Nadu and you cannot be any longer talking about local business with great credibility, if all these other language-speaking people become 25 per cent of the population. Then you can’t have this kind of paraquel thought of life.”
In the 2022 state budget, Finance Minister P.T.R. Palanivel Thiagarajan had announced that mobile information-cum-assistance centres will be set up in the state to ensure that migrant labourers have access to government welfare schemes, and are aware of their legal rights. Though such policies and wide data are available, “issues of the migrants need to be addressed at the early stage itself or it will have a snowballing effect in the future,” said Vanessa.
(Edited by Geethalakshmi Ramanathan)
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