New Delhi Reopens a Crack Amid Gloomy Economic Forecast for India

The lockdown that began easing on Monday was nowhere near as severe as the nationwide lockdown imposed by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, last year, which pushed millions of people out of cities and into rural areas, often on foot because rail and other transportation had been suspended. Mr. Modi resisted calls by many epidemiologists, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, to reinstitute similar curbs this year.

But in a nod to the chaos of last year’s lockdown, throughout the second wave, core infrastructure projects across the country, which employ millions of domestic migrant workers, were exempted from restrictions. More than 15,000 miles of Indian highway projects, along with rail and city Metro improvements, continued.

Most private construction sites, however, were closed down, placing workers like Ashok Kumar, a 36-year-old carpenter, in extremely precarious positions.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/31/world/asia/india-covid.html