Living with Multiple Vulnerabilities: Impact of COVID-19 on the Urban Poor in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region

The COVID-19 pandemic and the nationwide lockdown adversely affected the urban poor. The urban poor are a heterogeneous category and can oscillate economically in adverse social and economic situations. Informal workers, majority of whom can be categorised as the “urban poor” form 69.1% of urban India’s workforce (NSS, 2011–12) and remain largely invisible—both as workers and as residents. Millions of these workers and their families who travelled back to their villages by any means, in the midst of the lockdown, were the prime-time media focus for a few weeks. Yet, for years they have lived with severely compromised rights— characterised by high incidence of poverty, working with no social security, living in inadequate habitats in the city. In April 2020, as Mumbai emerged as the epicentre of the pandemic in India (Vyas and Shelar 2020), deep inequalities in the country’s financial region were exposed, with the poorest being worst impacted by the lockdown and in dire need of relief. 

This article is based on a study that reveals the conditions of the poor during the quickly evolving lockdown. Findings however, point to existing precarities of urban life and the need for a strong welfare net for the poor. The study conducted by Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action (YUVA) among 39,562 respondents in 10 cities of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) aimed to: (i) understand vulnerabilities within urban poor households that were being provided relief, (ii) map the impact of the lockdown, (iii) understand pre-existing coverage of entitlements and current access to government relief, and (iv) formulate recommendations for inclusive and collaborative rehabilitation. 

The study used a mixed methodology. The quantitative assessment included a survey of basic household demographics, access to government entitlements among 25,589 households from 10 cities in the MMR that were provided relief between 20 March–30 June 2020, and a survey of 13,801 travelling migrant workers who were provided support within the MMR between 14–30 May 2020. The qualitative assessment also involved in-depth telephonic interviews with 172 diverse participants between 19 May–17 June 2020 covering a range of topics such as access to housing, water, sanitation, livelihoods, financial security and access to relief among others.

Urban Poor in the MMR 

The MMR created in 1967 to include Mumbai and its surrounding areas, today has a total of nine municipal corporations, nine municipal councils, 35 census towns and 994 villages within its limits (MMRDA 2016). The MMR is largely urban in character, with nearly 91% of the population living in municipal areas and about 3.5% in census towns. Little under a third of urban households in MMR live in slums, in Mumbai the percentage population in slums is as high as 80%. This indicates that there is a severe lack of affordable housing options available. This is the single largest issue facing MMR, which has some of the highest real estate prices in the world. People are forced to relocate further away from the core city of Mumbai (where the majority of the formal jobs continue to be located) in search of affordable housing (MMRDA, 2016). As residents from cities in the MMR travel to Mumbai for work and essential services, the spread of the pandemic in its epicentre, Mumbai, is not restricted within its administrative boundaries but has severe implications for the entire region. Recent news reports suggest that while Mumbai accounts for 44% of the cases in the MMR, Kalyan-Dombivali is the next most affected followed by Navi Mumbai (Debroy 2020). The situation in the MMR is further compounded by the complex governance system present, with several municipalities and district administrations operating in the region.

Inadequate Habitats 

The households covered by the study live in varied housing conditions in the 10 cities. They include those living on streets, footpaths or public spaces (the homeless), those living in semi-permanent structures on footpaths (pavement dwellers), those evicted without any rehabilitation options and hence living in situations akin to the homeless, those living in slums (notified and non-notified) with varied housing conditions ranging from adequate to completely inadequate, those living in rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) colonies, in gaothans (urban villages), adivasi padas (tribal hamlets) and those living at places of work (markets, construction sites, and work sites). 

Insecure Livelihoods 

Among 21,504 households surveyed, the head of the household in 56.91% of the households earned daily wages, 39.05% received a monthly salary, and 4.60% earned a weekly income. Unavailability of work during the lockdown meant no wages and with the lockdown extended for months, even monthly wage earners struggled with employers resorting to wage cuts and layoffs (Table 1). Nearly 109 employment types were reported (Table 2) with a majority (45.56%) involved in construction work, followed by 14.8% engaged in domestic work, 7.27% working as drivers, 3.82% as street vendors and 0.87% as sanitation workers (Table 3). The lockdown left a sizeable proportion of this population that was previously earning without a source of income and dignity, forcing them to rely on various forms of relief as a means of sustenance. 

Table 1: Type of Income

Table 2: Employment Categories Reported: Livelihood Categories

Table 3: Percentage of Respondents Employed in each Occupation Category

Identity documents, such as ration cards, voter identity cards, bank accounts, Aadhaar cards, worker’s registration cards, etc, are a prerequisite to access welfare schemes and entitlements linked to food, livelihoods and healthcare. Additionally, possessing these documents gives the urban poor a legal identity within the system, citizenship and rights in the city. It doubles up as a form of proof to be able to access basic services such as water, sanitation, electricity and housing (YUVA 2017). The lack of identity documents has meant the inability to access government relief. During the lockdown, this was especially stark given that the ability to earn was stalled and households were reliant on relief. 

The Need for Food and Limitations in the Public Distribution System

The public distribution system (PDS) emerged as an integral safeguard to alleviate the distress of families that have found themselves out of money and food. In the wake of the lockdown, relief measures such as free additional ration till November 2020 under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) and subsidised ration for above poverty line (APL) saffron cardholders in Maharashtra were announced keeping in mind the growing crisis. The Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan relief package was announced for families without ration cards but only for a period of two months, which was not extended in July. Out of 14,133 households, 82.78% of the households surveyed were enrolled with the PDS and had ration cards. However, only 45.49% had ration cards registered within the MMR (Table 4). Among 4,805 households living on 16 construction sites1, only 10.38 % had ration cards registered in the city. 

Interviews with ration cardholders revealed that the possession of a ration card did not imply access, availability or adequacy of ration. Many of those interviewed reported surviving on dal-rice, sugar-rice, rotis or khichri throughout the lockdown period. Juhi, a child living in a slum in Turbhe, Navi Mumbai said “Whatever it costs for additional food items like milk, etc, it is too much for my family. So, we don’t eat those things anymore. For how long would we keep living on dal and water?” Some people took home lesser quantities of ration or no ration at all because they were told that the right names were not on the card or that their Aadhaar card was not linked to the ration card. Among ration cardholders, almost 18% reported not having linked their ration card to their Aadhaar card (Table 5).

Access to cooking fuel also became a challenge, further intensifying food insecurity. With only below poverty line (BPL) families eligible for the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), a majority of the urban poor still have to pay to access cooking fuel. A combination of barriers of access to essential food supplies, as well as the sudden fall in purchasing power due to loss of income and savings, led to high reported incidents of hunger during the lockdown. 

Table 4: State in which Household Ration Card Is Registered

Table 5: Percentage of Households Where the Ration Card is Linked to the Aadhar card.

*Total number of households with ration cards where data regarding Aadhar card linkage was collected, N=4,111 between 22/5/2020 and 30/6/2020.

Financial Insecurities and Direct Cash Transfers for a Few

“Since we didn’t know that a lockdown was going to be implemented, we didn’t really save up any money for it. My husband is a daily wage earner so we would run our house based on what he would earn during the day,” says Shayma, a home-based worker living in a slum in Bandra in Mumbai’s western suburbs. The loss of income deepened the uncertainties of households dependent on daily wages. As a relief measure direct cash transfers were initiated for women holding Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) accounts and construction workers registered with the Maharashtra Building and Other Construction Workers (BOCW) Welfare Board. Our data revealed that 6,418 households (63.27%) had a family member with a bank account and 3,412 households (23.13%) surveyed had a bank account in the name of a female family member. These were not necessarily PMJDY accounts where the cash transfer was made.

Many participants who received the cash transfer raised practical challenges about withdrawing the cash transferred and concerns over the insufficiency of the amount, that is, Rs 500 per month for April, May and June. Those who did not receive cash transfers raised two issues: (i) being unaware that the cash transfer was only for women’s accounts, and (ii) lack of awareness between a zero-balance account (that is, a Basic Saving Bank Deposit Account [BSBDA]) and a PMJDY account, with many having the former and hence ineligible for the cash transfer.

People interviewed stated that they had little or no savings and the growing uncertainty led to some selling and mortgaging personal belongings. Reasons reported for not being able to borrow were the existence of previous debts, unwillingness of employers to provide monetary support, and the inability of family and friends to lend money as they themselves were in financial distress. 

Relief for Select Informal Workers

For select workers engaged in the urban informal economy, the Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan curiously packaged distinct relief packages. Registered construction workers have been provided cash transfers, a form of “wage compensation.” Registered or surveyed street vendors and women self-help groups have been assured loans payable with interest, a “stimulus or recovery credit facility.” Health workers employed by the government in hospitals and healthcare centres were provided “health insurance” coverage for three months beginning 25 March, later extended till September. State governments further developed their own variations of these relief measures (IGSSS 2020). What remains stark, is that millions of other informal workers—domestic workers, waste recyclers, home-based workers, etc—have not been accounted for as workers in need of livelihood support and have remained invisible yet again. 

A mere glimpse into relief packages and pre-existing social security provisions for informal workers points to a vicious cycle of invisibilisation—lack of social and legal recognition of several types of informal work, poor implementation and bureaucratic registration procedures where laws do exist, inaccurate or outdated data that continues to inform policy and unwillingness to provide comprehensive social security for informal workers. 

Limited Access to Social Security for Construction Workers (6,937 surveyed, 21 interviewed)

The lockdown caused a sudden halt in construction work. Under the Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan the centre directed the state governments to utilise Rs 3,100 crore under BOCW fund to support construction workers. Acting on the advisory issued by the Centre, the Maharashtra BOCW welfare board made a one-time cash transfer of Rs 2,000 (Ray 2020). To access the relief announced, registration in the Maharashtra BOCW welfare board is compulsory. However, the biggest challenge in registering is furnishing a certificate that proves employment for 90 days from a single employer. This is more likely for those working on a single construction site for an extended period. Among the 4,805 workers working on 16 construction sites2 in the MMR, 963 workers (24.64%) reported being registered with the BOCW welfare board as compared to 87 workers (3.32%) who worked independently or were dependent on nakas3. Being registered, however, did not mean access to relief, i.e., the INR 2,000 one-time cash transfer made by the Maharashtra BOCW–WB. Among the 963 workers who reported being registered, only 284 workers (29.49%) had received the cash transfer. 

Loans for Street Vendors (581 surveyed, 12 interviewed)

As self-employed workers, street vendors depend on a variety of factors to earn a living—savings to purchase goods for sale, functioning of markets, public transport, public spaces and the purchasing capacities of people. In the absence of these, all street vendors reported a fall in their incomes. Among those surveyed 303 (70.14%) street vendors had bank accounts through which they could access a working capital loan of Rs 10,000 through the Pradhan Mantri Street Vendor’s Atmanirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme. However, hurdles to access lie in its eligibility criteria. Furnishing a registration certificate has been the first hurdle. Cities in the MMR have not conducted accurate street vendor’s surveys or issued registration certificates in the recent past when registration is supposed to be done every five years. Only those who can prove that they were vendors before 24 March 2020 are eligible. It does not take into account those who started street vending due to job loss during the lockdown. Moreover, a poor CIBIL score has meant this loan being denied to vendors by banks. Importantly, unless this loan is linked to the right to vend (which is mediated by the urban local body), a loan without the security of being free from eviction is self-defeating.

Health Insurance for Select Sanitation Workers (133 surveyed, 10 interviewed)

Sanitation workers include all workers engaged in sanitation-related work. These include self-employed waste recyclers, persons employed directly by the local government or on a contract basis to clean streets, public toilets, neighbourhoods or those who work in the garbage collection process. As part of the Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan relief announcements, the central government provided sanitation staff at government hospitals with insurance coverage and will provide 24% contribution towards provident fund for new employees hired by organisations registered under the Employees Provident Fund Organisation. The Government of Maharashtra provided insurance coverage to government, contractual, or outsourced staff of sanitation departments. All sanitation workers interviewed were hired on contract and had no job or wage security. Those who could work during the lockdown reported having no money due to indefinite delay in receiving wages. Waste recyclers reported a halt in their earnings during the lockdown.

No Social Security for Domestic Workers (2,253 surveyed, 20 interviewed)

Maharashtra is one of the few states that legally recognises domestic work and has a welfare board, that is, the Maharashtra Domestic Workers Welfare Board (MDWWB). However, no relief measure was announced for domestic workers. The Board has been non-functional since 2014 and has a one-person board representative. Currently, it only enables registrations and provides identity cards that need to be renewed annually. The study showed that only 152 (11.89%) domestic workers reported being registered with the MDWWB. The lack of welfare schemes coupled with an annual cost for renewal of registration has resulted in low registrations. As per the MDWWB Act, the board is mandated to ensure registration of domestic workers and provide social security. The board has been unsuccessful in doing both. In the current situation, it has also not made sure that employers are held accountable to pay wages. Most domestic workers spoke of non-payment of wages as a result of the inability to go to their places of work and experienced job insecurity. Some reported searching for alternative sources of employment. “We don’t have money for now. My children go begging, and we get some money or food. On some days I try to earn through waste recycling (waste picking),” said Nasreen, a domestic worker experiencing homelessness in Matunga in Mumbai’s Island City.

Migration During the Lockdown

Migration in the MMR 

The urban agglomeration of Mumbai that includes Mumbai City, Mumbai Suburban and Thane recorded 43.02% of its population as migrants during the 2011 Census. Amongst this population, though the absolute number of workers had increased over the previous decade, the share of interstate migrants saw a decline in percentage due to increasing opportunities in other parts of the country, high cost of living in Mumbai and increasing regionalism. On the other hand, intra-state migration has seen an increase owing to unbalanced regional development, prolonged rural distress and inadequately developed Tier-2 cities across the state forcing the workers to concentrate in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) (Shaikh 2019).

Migration—Why, Where to and How

The lockdown forced many to return to their villages for multiple reasons, ranging from loss of work, the resultant inability to pay for the cost of living in the city to the fear of contracting the virus. Some were contemplating going back to their villages in the future if the situation worsened. Some who had returned to their villages expressed their willingness to come back if things returned to normal. There were many who could not earn but stayed on in the city. The reasons for this have largely been linked to the travel procedure being expensive, bureaucratic and unpredictable; the fear of being a burden on their families in the village; having no land or home in the village and the city as their only home.

Data collected from nearly 13,801 travelling workers revealed that the highest number were returning to Uttar Pradesh (19.14%), followed by Rajasthan (6.38%) and other places within Maharashtra (2.38%). Since data was recorded when workers were enroute or awaiting information regarding trains in large groups, it was not always possible to capture the destination state of each group separately. Other states to which these groups were travelling included Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. In order to reach home, workers were using several modes of transport based on availability, cost effectiveness and urgency. These included trains, trucks, and buses if available; to more extreme measures such as travelling thousands of kilometres on foot, by auto-rickshaw or in big containers. Data revealed that 50.73% were travelling back by train, followed by 10.26% travelling back by truck, the third most common mode of travel to return home was on foot (8.58%) highlighting the absence of sufficient transportation, the urgency to return home and in some cases the unaffordability of travelling by other modes, with even the special trains charging fares from the already impoverished workers (Dutta 2020). Four workers reported attempting to walk all the way to Assam and 24 workers were walking all the way to Nepal! 

Intersecting Vulnerabilities

Multiple Vulnerabilities Owing to Inadequate Habitats

Living in inadequate habitats creates additional challenges. The inability to prove residence has a bearing on accessing identity documents resulting in the denial of government provided entitlements and relief. The homeless and those living on rent were most vulnerable to eviction during the lockdown, despite orders to prohibit forced evictions and moratorium on rents. Moreover, basic services such as water, sanitation, electricity, toilets and healthcare became additional financial liabilities during the lockdown. These costs differed across settlements and cities.

Access to water that had been difficult and expensive even prior to the lockdown in many settlements, continued to remain challenging. For Nawaz, living in a slum in Mandala in Mumbai’s Eastern Suburbs, water was very expensive. “Every day we pay 50 rupees for water which makes it 1,500 rupees per month.” Some participants shared that their water bills were only temporarily deferred during the lockdown, ‘We have to give money later. Now during the lockdown, they are noting it in their account book.” 

Majority of the residents were dependent on public toilets. A considerable number reported practicing open defecation due to lack of functioning public toilets, and others with access to public toilets reported being charged for using them. “Here, people don’t have money for food, but they still have to keep paying to go to the bathroom,” complained Deepa living in Bandra in Mumbai’s Western Suburbs. The situation also affected women far more. Nasreen, a homeless woman in Mumbai’s Island City shared, “They take 10 rupees from us to use the bathroom if we want to change our clothes there. When we don’t have money, we can’t change clothes.”

Gendered Lives

The comparative disadvantage faced by women and gender minorities during any disaster situation exists in both private and public spaces. Nearly 43% of households surveyed were women-headed households and 14 women interviewed were household heads. Sushma, a resident of a slum in Mumbai’s eastern suburbs who looked after her children by doing domestic work after her abusive husband left home four years ago shared, “I had so much pride that despite being a woman, I am able to earn money and support my children’s future and education. But this coronavirus has really changed everything. Now who knows what the future will be like?” Majority of these women faced several issues with their ration cards and were unable to access the full benefits they deserved resulting in frequent hunger during the lockdown. Some women were not even aware of welfare entitlements. Baani’s mother had moved from cooking gas to kerosene to firewood because of her inability to buy cooking fuel. Many women needed financial assistance to pay for children’s school fees, rent, electricity, water and public toilets that they were forced to pay for during the lockdown. 

Six transgender persons interviewed depended on begging that stopped during the lockdown. Expenses that they found tough to manage included food, rent, electricity, water and medicines. Jyoti, a 53-year-old transgender person living in Nalasopara in Vasai–Virar, heard on television that the government was crediting Rs 500 in Jan Dhan accounts. However, on checking her Jan Dhan account, she realised that she did not receive any cash support. The cash relief was restricted to women alone, even in a situation where transgender persons were extremely vulnerable. Furthermore, most did not have ration cards and faced challenges to access the PDS. Some of them had their names registered on their family ration card. It is not uncommon among gender minorities to be estranged by their family. If someone is already registered on a family ration card but wants to get a new one, the PDS system needs them to remove their names from the family ration card, which is difficult for an estranged family member. 

In Conclusion

Vulnerable sections among the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, De-notified Tribes, Nomadic Tribes, women, children, the elderly, transgender persons, and persons with disability were affected disproportionately during the lockdown. Over and above the historical burden of marginalisation, findings reveal that their existing deprivation has exacerbated their inability to access basic needs and rights, rendering them bereft of self-respect and dignity. The pandemic has shown that there is an urgent need to expand the welfare net for the poor among the marginalised by measures such as universalisation of the PDS, prioritisation of direct cash transfers and social security for informal workers. Through these interventions, people’s rights and dignity can be somewhat safeguarded in such dire circumstances.

During the lockdown, it became obvious as confirmed by the data from our study that the difficulty for marginalised populations to access welfare has exposed them to additional risks, converting a pandemic into a life-threatening situation. While the current situation is dynamic and as the lockdowns ease, working is gradually possible for many. However, availability of work, cost of living in the region and household expenses remain challenging. In this context, the prioritisation of adequate habitats and a humane and strong welfare net remains as significant.