Paper short abstract:

The paper tries to understand the relationship between caste and migration in Kerala, South India.

Paper long abstract:

My paper explores the relationship between migration and caste identities. Based on long term ethnographic work among workers migrating to Kerala from North and North eastern India, it explores how migration draws on caste based kinship relations. Migration for construction work and remittances are used to overcome dependence on income from agricultural work. It traces the role of caste in organizing work in construction sites and persistence of jobbers in disciplining of workers. Migration forms the basis of alliances between Dalits and other backward castes as they negotiate new destinations and work-places together. Based on fieldwork among migrant workers who formed an independent trade-union, it looks at their self identification as "hindi mazdoor" ( hindi workers) that signal to the formation of new fault lines of stratification and alliance. Identities based on caste, class and region/language are intertwined in the process of migration and in shaping labour practices and resistance.