Migration

KEY TRENDS 

•    59% of women migrants from STs backgrounds and 41% of SCs background were short term and circulatory migrants in comparison to just 18% of migrant women workers of upper caste origin. 39% of women migrants from Other Backward Classes (OBCs) backgrounds were also short term and circulatory migrants, although the majority (65%) were long-term and medium-term migrants in comparison to 43% of SC and 32% of ST women in these latter categories $

•    While 5% of the female migrant workers and 9% of the male migrants reported having been targets of harassment by local people at destinations, 23% of the women and 20% of the men had experienced violence, threats and being forced to work in the course of migration. Interestingly, among male migrants, contractors were identified as the most common perpetrator, while more than half the women who had faced such harassment/ violence identified the principal employer and the supervisor as the perpetrators $

•    78% of rural and 59% of urban women migrant workers were working as unskilled manual labour; 16% and 18% were in skilled manual work in rural and urban areas respectively. A total of 6% of the rural and 23% of the urban women migrants were in a combination of clerical, supervisory, managerial jobs, or work requiring high professional/educational skills (highly skilled). Ten per cent of the urban women migrants were in the last category of the highly skilled in comparison to just 1% of the rural women migrants $

•    Across the board, the overwhelming majority of the workers – more than 93% in the case of rural women migrants and more than 84% in the case of urban – had no provident fund and no health insurance. The worst situation was, however, in relation to daycare/crèche facilities, to which only 3.4% of the rural women migrants and 4.4% of the urban had any access at all $

•    Proportion of households migrated to rural areas was very low, nearly 1 per cent. In urban areas, on the other hand, the migrated households constituted nearly 3 percent of all urban households ¥

•    The migration rate (proportion of migrants in the population) in the urban areas (35 per cent) was far higher than the migration rate in the rural areas (26 per cent) ¥

$ Migration  and Gender in India by Indrani Mazumdar, N Neetha and Indu Agnihotri, Economic and Political Weekly, March 9, 2013, Vol xlvIiI No 10

¥ Migration in India, 2007-08, National Sample Survey, MOSPI, Government of India,
http://mospi.nic.in/Mospi_New/upload/nss_press_note_533_15june10.pdf

OVERVIEW 

Keeping track of mass migration is an enumerator’s nightmare. Even the Census of India can’t always get this accurately. Before a government agency is able to take note of distress or seasonal migration, people often come back for the harvest season or move elsewhere. Mass seasonal migration has become an almost fixed event for some industries like brick manufacturing or sugarcane farming. Distress and seasonal migration invariably means no education for children, no voting rights for adults, and missing out on BPL facilities at either place of birth or the site of work. 

The worst sufferers of seasonal and distress migration are the poorest of poor, the tribals (STs) and the Dalits (SCs), who invariably have meager base of human or physical assets. This is particularly so in the most backward and mostly rain-fed districts of Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, MP, Karnataka and Maharashtra. It is quite common for migrant women to work as agricultural labourers and for men to seek employment in the unorganized sector. 

Distress migration also fuels a chaotic growth of unorganized/ informal industries and haphazard expansion of urban slums. Owners of small and informal factories love migrant workers. For they are more willing to work for less wages, are less likely to be absent for trivial reasons, are dependent on labour contractors and are powerless compared to local workforce. Their vulnerability and low wages may be of short-term advantage to the industry, but in the long run they fail to participate in India’s growth story by earning more and consuming more. That is why it is often argued that rural-urban migration can lead to prosperity only when a ‘pull factor’ of better paid work replaces the push-factor of rural poverty.    

Between 1991 and 2001, as many as 73 million rural people have migrated (displaced from their place of birth) to elsewhere. But the majority of these people (53 million) moved to other villages and less than a third (20 million) to urban areas and mostly in search of jobs. The number of seasonal or cyclic migration is around 2 crore but some experts believe that the actual number could be ten times the official figure.  

**page**

According to the report titled: Migration and Gender in India by Indrani Mazumdar, N Neetha and Indu Agnihotri, Economic and Political Weekly, March 9, 2013, Vol xlvIiI No 10:

•    This paper presents a sketch of the key findings of a research project on Gender and Migration at the Centre for Women’s Development Studies. The results of a series of primary surveys conducted between 2009 and 2011 across 20 states have been consolidated to present a summary meso-level view of types of migration, patterns of female labour migration, conditions of work and civic life of women migrant workers. The sectoral composition of paid migrant workers based on the latest available migration survey by the National Sample Survey Office is presented for contextual background, alongside a critical interrogation of the official data’s gender insensitive concepts. Rising rates of marriage migration juxtaposed against falling female work participation rates and the spread of dowry are also touched upon.

•    The Centre for Women’s Development Studies' (CWDS) meso-level consolidation of a series of primary micro-surveys conducted with a common pair of questionnaires between 2009 and 2011 (over consecutive as well as overlapping periods) spanned 20 of the country’s 28 states. It includes comprehensive surveys in 43 village sites in 17 of these states, combined with surveys in select sectors with concentrations of migrant women workers in both urban and rural areas, across all 20 states. Individual-based questionnaires covered 3,073 female migrant workers drawn from village and sector sites and 1,934 male migrant workers (mostly outmigrants) drawn only from village sites. Household characteristics/ details and brief profiles of household members were gathered separately for each of these migrants plus 673 households without any economic migrants from the village sites for comparison.

Types of migration

•    Strikingly, only 42% of the women migrants and 36% of the males were long-term migrants or in other words, 58% of female labour migration and even more of male labour migration appears to be of a temporary nature. (In contrast, the picture that emerges from the NSS (2007-08) indicates temporary migration definitively for only one-third of all labour migration in India, and perhaps a little more if return migrants are also added).

•    Twenty per cent of the migrating women and 23% of the migrating men were circular migrants (longer durations exceeding four months and shorter durations of less than four months in each spell), 9% were short-term seasonal migrants (distinguished from circular both in terms of duration as well as in spending the major part of the working year in their village/place of origin) for both males and females, 2% of the female and 3% of the male migrants were irregular short-term migrants (i.e, outside any established pattern or occupation and driven by abnormal contingencies/desperation). Since all of the above are forms of short-term migration, when taken together, the CWDS surveys suggest that the share of short-term migration at around one-third of labour migration is far greater than accounted for by the NSS.

•    After excluding pre-selected female migrant intensive sectors, the share of short-term migration was much higher at 41% among women migrants and 53% among male migrants, which highlights the reality of large-scale migration from village India beyond just the urbanisation paradigm and indeed a degree of pullback that is rarely touched upon in migration theories.

•    Six per cent of the women and 7% of the men were long distance commuters (across distances outside the perimeter of normal movement for work around any village or within any town/city), 4% of the women migrants and 2% of the men were migrants for family care (for unpaid care work separated from marriage migration with unspecified purposes). Medium-term migration (i.e, for a broadly fixed period of up to a few years in any particular industry/occupation) accounted for 16% of the women migrants and 18% among the men. It is interesting that when village sites alone constituted the universe, the proportions of medium-term migrants dropped sharply to 9% for women, but increased to 21% for men.

Gendered Patterns of Labour Migration

•    59% of women migrants from STs backgrounds and 41% of SCs background were short term and circulatory migrants in comparison to just 18% of migrant women workers of upper caste origin.

•    39% of women migrants from Other Backward Classes (OBCs) backgrounds were also short term and circulatory migrants, although the majority (65%) were long-term and medium-term migrants in comparison to 43% of SC and 32% of ST women in these latter categories.

•    After migration, 40% of the women workers were in more diversified industry and services in comparison to 51% of the male migrant workers.

•    In rural areas, occupational shifts through migration by women appear to be concentrating in circular migration for brick-making (bhatta workers) across the length and breadth of the country, even though agriculture is the most prominent destination for rural women migrants. The labouring units in brick-making and cane cutting (where female labour is involved) largely comprises male-female pairs (jodis) or family units and generally a cycle of advances and debt-based tying of such labour. Jodi-based wage labour combined with piece rated payment, leaves no scope for independent work/activity and income for women. It was striking that 42% of the rural women migrant workers were involved in such pair, family or ad hoc group-based employment.

•    In urban areas, close to one-third of the migrant women workers (31%) were either unemployed or engaged in only family domestic duties before migration (in comparison to 15% of rural women migrants). Only a small proportion of the urban women migrants had a pre-migration background in agricultural work (13%) and many were in service sector or other diverse jobs even before migration (20% were in paid domestic work and 30% in diversified services before migration). The process of concentration in paid domestic work (whose proportions almost trebled from around 10% before migration to 28% post-migration) was the most gender distinctive feature of urban wards labour migration by women.

Other Migration Processes

•    A little over half of the women migrant workers (rural and urban combined) identified poverty, debt, decline in income, lack of local employment or loss of such employment as their reason for migration. The majority, however (62%), bore their migration costs out of household savings. Women migrated more with family members (43%) while men migrated more alone (43%). Nevertheless, it is significant that close to a quarter of the women (23%) reported having migrated alone and 7% in all female groups, although this is substantially less than the 43% of the men who migrated alone and the 19% who had gone in all male groups. Further, while 25% of the rural and 6% of the urban women migrants were dependent/ mobilised by contractors, 81% of the urban and 63% of the rural women migrants said they migrated independently – whether with families or alone.

•    72% of the female migrant workers with urban destinations were below 36 years of age in comparison to 63% of the male migrants to urban areas. Similarly 61% of the female migrant workers with rural destinations were below 36 in comparison to 56% of rural male migrants. Most striking was the higher proportion of women migrant workers in the age group 15-25. Thirty-four per cent of the urban female migrant workers were in the 15-25 age group in comparison to 22% of the urban male migrant workers and on a slightly lower scale of difference, 24% of the women with rural destinations were in this age group in comparison to 19% of the rural male migrant workers.

•    While 5% of the female migrant workers and 9% of the male migrants reported having been targets of harassment by local people at destinations, 23% of the women and 20% of the men had experienced violence, threats and being forced to work in the course of migration. Interestingly, among male migrants, contractors were identified as the most common perpetrator, while more than half the women who had faced such harassment/ violence identified the principal employer and the supervisor as the perpetrators.

•    While most women migrant workers migrated with their minor children (67%), only around a quarter of the male migrants (26%) of the male migrant workers took their minor children with them.

Conditions of Work among Women Migrant Workers

•    78% of rural and 59% of urban women migrant workers were working as unskilled manual labour; 16% and 18% were in skilled manual work in rural and urban areas  respectively. A total of 6% of the rural and 23% of the urban women migrants were in a combination of clerical, supervisory, managerial jobs, or work requiring high professional/educational skills (highly skilled). Ten per cent of the urban women migrants were in the last category of the highly skilled in comparison to just 1% of the rural women migrants.

•    Casual labour in the private sector was the most prominent form of pre-migration employment among rural women migrants (41%), whose share also increased post-migration (44%); but it was the share of contract labour that showed the most significant increase from pre to post-migration rising from 13% before migration to 26% after. Of rural female labour migration (i e, after migration), 70% was for casual and contract work.

•    Among urban migrant women workers, the share of regular employment for private employers showed the most striking and maximum increase post-migration (almost doubling from 21% before migration to reach 41% after), although the insecure nature of much of this “regular” employment was evident with 85% of the surveyed urban women migrants reporting they had no maternity leave and 80% had no medical leave.

•    Across the board, the overwhelming majority of the workers – more than 93% in the case of rural women migrants and more than 84% in the case of urban – had no provident fund and no health insurance. The worst situation was, however, in relation to daycare/crèche facilities, to which only 3.4% of the rural women migrants and 4.4% of the urban had any access at all.

•    In rural destinations, the majority of women workers (68%) worked for eight hours and below per day, but in peak season the majority (68%) worked well over eight hours with 41% working above 10 hours of which around half (20%) worked over 12 hours a day. In urban destinations, 78% worked eight hours and below in normal periods, but this dropped to 57% in peak seasons, with 21% working up to 10 hours, 15% from 10 to 12 hours, and 6% above 12 hours.

Modes of Payment and Wages

•    Around 20% of both rural and urban women migrants were on daily wages. The average daily wage/income for these women migrants in rural areas was Rs 136, and in urban areas, it was Rs 141. Prominent among women migrants with rural destinations who were daily wage/income earners were agricultural workers (47%), brick kiln workers (28%)13 and manufacturing workers (8%). In urban areas, construction accounted for 67% of daily wagers, vendors/petty traders for 9% and manufacturing for 7%.

•    In rural areas, 22% of the women migrant workers had monthly payment of wages – of an average amount of Rs 4,778. In urban areas, 64% of the women migrants received wages on a monthly basis – of an average amount of Rs 6,729. Of the women migrants in rural areas, 29% received payment at the end of contracted work periods (mostly brick kiln and agricultural workers).14 Only 4% of the urban women migrants were so paid.

•    Thirty-two per cent of the rural and 45% of the urban women migrants were paid at minimum wage rates, and only 5% of the rural and 11% of the urban received wages above the statutory minimum. Of the rural women migrants 64% and 44% of the urban women migrants received either below the minimum wage or did not know about minimum wages.

•    Among daily wager rural migrants – 13% of the women earned less than Rs 100 in comparison to just 3% of the men, while 23% of the men earned Rs 250 and above in comparison to a mere 0.2% of the women. The same pattern was visible among weekly earners in both rural and urban areas. However, among urban daily wagers, while 17% of the women migrants were earning less than Rs 100 in comparison to just 2% of the men, only 2% of the urban daily wager migrants – men and women – received wages/ incomes of Rs 250 and above. Twenty-eight per cent of the rural women migrants were paid on a weekly basis in comparison to 13% of the urban.

Of Remittances and Civic Amenities

•    Of the women migrants with rural destinations 32%, and 33% of those with urban destinations sent or brought no remittances to their source areas. At the other extreme 9% with rural destinations and 11% with urban destinations remitted their entire incomes.

•    At their destinations, 76% of all the women migrant workers (rural + urban) did not have any ration card, 16% had below poverty line (BPL) cards, less than half a per cent had Antyodaya cards and 7% had above poverty line (APL) cards. In comparison in their source areas, 34% of these migrants had no ration cards, 40% had BPL cards, 6% had Antyodaya cards and 20% had APL cards. Loss of public distribution system (PDS) entitlements  through migration was thus quite widespread. It was found that 91% of the women migrant workers had never availed of any public housing scheme, 79% had no National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) job cards, and 96% had never been employed under any public employment programme or scheme.

•    75% of all the women migrant workers did have electoral cards, but again the majority of them (almost three quarters) had their voting rights at area of origin and only around 28% of those with electoral cards had voting rights at destination areas. Of the women migrants 10% had voted in the last parliamentary elections at destination in comparison to 46% at area of origin. For state assembly elections 13% had voted at destination in comparison to 47% at area of origin. For panchayat/ municipality, again 13% had voted at destination but 52% at area of origin.

**page**

According to Migration in India, 2007-08, National Sample Survey, MOSPI,
Government of India,
http://mospi.nic.in/Mospi_New/upload/nss_press_note_533_15june10.pdf:

A. Household migration during last 365 days

• Proportion of households migrated to rural areas was very low, nearly 1 per cent. In urban areas, on the other hand, the migrated households constituted nearly 3 percent of all urban households.

• Migration of households was largely confined within State: 78 percent of the migrant households in rural areas and 72 per cent of the migrant households in the urban areas had last usual place of residence within the State.

• Migration of households in both the rural and urban areas was dominated by the migration of households from rural areas. Nearly 57 per cent of urban migrant households migrated from rural areas whereas 29 per cent of rural migrant households migrated from urban areas.

• In both rural and urban areas, majority of the households migrated for employment related reasons. Nearly 55 per cent of the migrant households in rural areas and 67 per cent of the migrant households in the urban areas had migrated for employment related reasons.

B. Migrants
 
• In India, nearly 29 per cent of the persons were migrants with significant rural-urban and male-female differentials.

• The migration rate (proportion of migrants in the population) in the urban areas (35 per cent) was far higher than the migration rate in the rural areas (26 per cent).

• Magnitude of male migration rate was far lower than female migration rate, in both rural and urban areas. In rural areas nearly 48 per cent of the females were migrants while the male migration rate was only 5 per cent, and in the urban areas, the male migration rate was nearly 26 per cent compared to female migration rate of 46 per cent.

• Migration rate in rural areas was lowest among the scheduled tribe (ST), nearly 24 per cent, and it was highest among those classified in the social group ‘others’, nearly 28 per cent.

• In urban areas, migration rate was lowest among other backward class (OBC) nearly 33 per cent, and it was highest among those classified in the social group ‘others’, nearly 38 per cent.

• Migration rate was found to be lowest for bottom MPCE decile class in both rural and urban areas and there is an increasing trend in rate of migration with the increase in level of living, with the migration rate attaining peak in top decile class. Migration rate, for rural male, for the bottom MPCE decile class was nearly 3 per cent and 17 per cent in the top decile class. For rural females, migration rate was 39 per cent in the bottom MPCE decile class and 59 per cent in top decile class.

• For urban males the migration rate for the bottom MPCE decile class was 10 per cent which reached to 46 per cent in top decile class and for urban females the migration rate for the bottom and top decile classes was 36 per cent and 56 per cent, respectively.

• For rural male, migration rate was lowest (nearly 4 per cent) among the ‘not literates’, and it was nearly 14 per cent among those with educational level ‘graduate and above’. For urban males also, it was lowest among the ‘not literates’ (17 per cent), and 38 per cent for those with educational level ‘graduate or above’ level.

• Among the migrants in the rural areas, nearly 91 per cent had migrated from the rural areas and 8 per cent had migrated from the urban areas, whereas among the migrants in the urban areas, nearly 59 per cent migrated from the rural areas and 40 per cent from urban areas.

• Nearly 60 per cent of urban male migrants and 59 per cent of urban female migrants had migrated from rural areas.

• The most prominent reason for female migration in both the rural and urban areas was marriage: for 91 per cent of rural female migrants and 61 per cent of the urban female migrants the reason was marriage.

• The reason for migration for male migrant, was dominated by employment related reasons, in both rural and urban areas. Nearly 29 per cent of rural male migrants and 56 per cent of urban male migrants had migrated due to employment related reasons.

• A higher percentage of the persons were found to be engaged in economic activities after migration: for males the percentage of workers increased from 51 per cent before migration to 63 per cent after migration in rural areas and from 46 per cent to 70 per cent in urban areas, while for females it increased from 20 per cent to 33 per cent in rural areas and from 8 per cent to 14 per cent in urban areas.

• For rural males, self-employment had emerged as main recourse to employment after migration. The share of self-employment in total migrants increased from 16 per cent before migration to 27 per cent after migration, while the shares of regular employees and casual labours remained almost stable, in both before and after migration.

• In case of urban males, the percentage of regular wage/salaried employees has shown a quantum jump (from 18 per cent before migration to 39 per cent after migration), besides an increase in the share of self-employment after migration (from 17 per cent to 22 per cent), and casual labour as a means of employment had reduced in importance after migration (from 11 per cent to 8 per cent).

• Rate of return migration (proportion of return migrants in the population) for males in rural areas was significantly higher than females: 24 per cent for males and 11 per cent for females.

• In the urban areas, the rate of return migration did not differ much for males and females: it was 12 per cent for males and 10 per cent for females.

C. Short-term Migrants

• The rate of short-term migration (proportion of short-term migrants in the population) was 1.7 per cent in the rural areas and almost negligible (much less than 1 per cent) in the urban areas. Moreover, in the rural areas, the rate was nearly 3 per cent for the males and less than 1 per cent for females.

• In rural areas, for both males and females short-term migrants, more than half were casual workers in their usual principal activity status.

• The share of the rural self-employed males in total short-term male migration was also significant, nearly 32 per cent, and rural females who were out of labour force in the usual principal activity status, shared nearly 24 per cent of the total short-term female migration.

D. Out- Migrants

• Out-migration rate (proportion of out-migration in the population) for males was nearly 9 per cent from rural areas and 5 per cent from urban areas. The rates for females were much higher compared to males in both the rural and urban areas. It was 17 per cent among rural females and 11 per cent among urban females.

• A relatively higher percentage of female out-migrants, from both the rural and urban areas, took up residence within the State: nearly 89 per cent for rural female out-migrants and 80 per cent for urban female out-migrants had residence within the State.

• Majority of the male from both the rural and urban areas had migrated out for employment related reasons which accounted for nearly 80 per cent of the outmigrants  from the rural areas and 71 per cent of the out-migrants from the urban areas.

• For female out-migrants from both rural and urban areas, the reason for outmigration was predominantly for marriage, which accounted for nearly 84 per cent of female out-migrants from both the rural and urban areas.

• In case of rural male out-migrants, residing abroad, nearly 95 per cent were engaged in economic activities compared to 80 per cent of those residing in India and for male out-migrants from urban areas nearly 93 per cent of those residing abroad were engaged in economic activities compared to 73 per cent of those residing in India.

E. Out-migrant Remittances

• Among the male out-migrants from the rural areas and residing abroad, nearly 82 per cent had sent remittances during the last 365 days, while only 58 per cent of those residing in India had sent remittances.

• Among male out-migrants from the urban areas, nearly 69 per cent of those residing abroad had sent remittances compared to only 41 per cent of those residing in India.

• On an average, during the last 365 days, a male out-migrant from rural areas and residing abroad had sent 4 times the amount of remittances sent by an out-migrant residing in India: while on an average nearly Rs. 52,000 was remitted by those residing abroad, the amount was nearly Rs. 13,000 for those residing in India.

• Out-migrants from the urban areas had remitted higher amount, during the last 365 days, to their former households compared to those from rural areas. On an average a male out-migrant from the urban areas, and residing abroad, had remitted nearly Rs. 73,000 during the last 365 days, which was higher by nearly Rs. 21000 of the amount remitted by a male out-migrant from rural areas and residing abroad. On an average, during the last 365 days, male out-migrants from urban areas and residing in India had remitted on an average nearly Rs. 28,000.

• The amount of remittances from the female out-migrants from both the rural and urban areas was lower compared to their male counterparts, irrespective of whether the female out-migrants are residing in India or abroad.

According to Managing the Exodus: Grounding Migration in India, which has been prepared by American India Foundation,(http://www.aifoundation.org/documents/Report-ManagingtheExodus.pdf):   

• Migration is defined as the displacement of a person who leaves their place of birth or of residence for another place, most often remaining in country. In 2001, 309 million persons were migrants based on place of last residence, which constitute about 30% of the total population of the country. This figure indicates an increase of around 37% from the 1991 census, which recorded 226 million migrants. It is estimated that 98 million people moved within the country between 1991 & 2001

• Traditional rural-urban migration has seen a gradual increase, with its share in total migration rising from 16.5% to 21.1% between 1971 and 2001.

• There has been an increase of urban to urban migration from 13.6% to 14.7% over three decades (1971-2001).

• In 2001, rural to rural migration (during the last decade) has accounted for 54.7% of total migration

• The last decade the urban to rural migration figure stands as 6.2 million people, i.e. approximately 6% of the population that moved between 1991-2001.

• 'Seasonal migration' has long been practiced in the rural areas, particularly among landless laborers and marginal farmers with limited livelihood options. Livelihood opportunities, its dearth in the rural and abundance in the urban areas are therefore responsible for the majority of migration. Media exposure and growth of the metros is another reason that allures people to move from rural to urban areas. In tribal regions, intrusion of outsiders, the pattern of settlement, displacement and deforestation, are significant to drive the phenomenon of migration. Marriage accounts for more than half of the migrants.

• In India, 73 million people in rural areas have migrated from 1991 – 2001; of which 53 million have moved to other villages and 20 million to urban areas – a majority of them in search of work. These figures do not include temporary or seasonal migration.

• Poor states such as Orissa, Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh that experienced rapid demographic growth in urban areas were also those that reported low productivity and high unemployment in agrarian sectors as well as heavy pressure on urban infrastructural facilities, suggesting the presence of push factors behind rural-urban migration.

• Caste, kinship bonds, and other kinds of village networks do help rural job seekers to arrange urban-based jobs.

• Migration is associated with rising informalisation of work and growth of urban slums.

• By 2021, India will have the largest concentration of mega-cities in the world; with a population exceeding 10 million people The UN projects that half of the world population will live in urban areas by the end of 2008, primarily due to urbanization and migration.

• National averages suggested that about 205 households live in each notified slum and 112 in each nonnotified slums.

• The total number of slums in urban India are approximately 52,000 with 51% of the slums being notified  slums.

• It is estimated that every seventh person living in the urban areas is a slum dweller.

• About 65% of slums are built on public land, owned mostly by local bodies, state government etc.

• Maharashtra has the highest number of urban slums in the country totaling 173 – 113 notified and 60 non-notified
 

**page**

According to Internal Displacement: Global Overview of Trends and Developments in 2009, produced by Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre and Norwegian Refugee Council,
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/lib.nsf/db900sid/CJUE-85JGSH/$file/IDMC_May2010.pdf?openelement:

• Number of countries covered by this report is 54

• Number of people internally displaced by conflict or violence as of December 2009 is 27.1 million

• Over half of the world’s internally displaced persons (IDPs) were in five countries: Sudan, Colombia, Iraq, DRC and Somalia. The region with most IDPs was Africa, with 11.6 million.

• South and South-East Asia and the Americas accounted for most of the increase, with their respective totals 800,000 and 500,000 higher. These increases mirrored the year-on-year growth in the internally displaced populations of Pakistan and Colombia.

• Since 1997, the number of IDPs has steadily increased from around 17 million to over 27 million in 2009.

• In 21 countries, people had been born and grown to adulthood in displacement.

• Internal armed conflict, rather than international armed conflict, has caused most internal displacement in the last decade.

• Number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in India is at least 500,000

• This figure includes those people displaced since 1990 by separatist violence targeting the Hindu minority in Jammu and Kashmir, and by shelling between Indian and Pakistani forces along Kashmir’s “line of control”; those displaced in states of the north-east by conflicts ongoing since 1947 between state and ethnic or secessionist groups, and by inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic violence; victims of the conflict between Naxalite insurgents and government security forces and armed vigilantes in Chhattisgarh State; victims of communal violence between the majority Hindu populations in Gujarat and Orissa States and the States’ respective Muslim and Christian minorities; and people displaced in West Bengal by violence related to a proposed development project.

• In 2009, people were newly displaced by armed conflict and violence in the north-east (Manipur, Assam, and Mizoram States) and in Orissa State.

• Causes of internal displacement in India are: armed conflict, generalized violence and human rights violations

• Tribal IDPs in camps in Chhattisgarh face the risk of attacks by both government forces and Naxalite insurgents. Muslim IDPs in Gujarat continue to endure very poor living conditions and they are increasingly at risk of losing their original homes and land, which have been taken over by Hindu extremist groups.

• Christian IDPs in Orissa risk being forced to convert to Hinduism if they return to their homes. Displaced women in Assam and Manipur have increasingly been forced into prostitution in order to support their families in the absence of husbands who have left in search of work.

• After living in displacement for more than 15 years, displaced Kashmiri Pandit families risk losing their cultural identity, while the government refers to them as “migrants”.

• Conflict-induced IDPs enjoy no recognition under India’s national laws. The responsibility to protect them is generally left to state authorities, who are often unaware of their rights or reluctant to offer support, particularly in cases where they played a role in causing the displacement.

According to the 11^th Five Year Plan, Planning Commission

http://www.planningcommission.nic.in/plans/planrel/fiveyr/11th/11_v3/11v3_ch4.pdf:  

The fact that the numbers of the poor have declined in rural areas, and increased in urban areas over the last three decades suggests that to escape rural poverty, the poor migrate to urban areas. In fact, the total number of migrant workers in India in 1999–2000 was 10.27 crore—a staggering number. The number of seasonal or cyclical migrants in India may be 2 crore or so.