Paper short abstract:

This study explores the challenges for short-term migrants accessing welfare in India, revealing structural deficiencies in sub-national welfare. It emphasises the need for welfare delivery to account for the intersection between temporal nature of migration and informality.

Paper long abstract:

Short-term and circular migrants are often excluded from functional welfare provisioning in destination states. While internal migrants are nominally protected by freedom of movement and the right to work in India, this article explores the disjuncture between the formal and realized citizenship experiences of migrants claiming welfare. Drawing on a mixed-method qualitative study of ethnographic research and a sample survey in Delhi and Kerala, it presents the everyday lived experiences of migrants accessing welfare in India. By elucidating the complex labyrinth of the Indian welfare ecosystem at the sub-national level, the study highlights the structural and experiential deficiencies that emerge at the destination state for migrant workers to access welfare.

The analysis of migrant construction workers' access to labour schemes reveals differences in the conditionalities and modalities of registration and claim, creating differential sub-national welfare ecosystems for migrants within the nation-state. These ecosystems create a knowledge and administrative deficit that keeps migrants at the fringe of the welfare state. Findings from the original sample survey with migrant workers also indicate the incompatibility in the conditionalities of welfare with the temporal existence of migrants in the destination states. The findings from the study advocate the need for welfare policies to account for the intersection of the temporality of migration and informality to create an effective and inclusive citizenship pathway.