Telangana worker’s dead body brought home amid Israel-Iran ceasefire

 Mansi Bhaktwani

The Migration Bulletin is a monthly round-up that compiles news and developments pertaining to India’s migrant workforce. In this month's bulletin, we track the return of a migrant worker’s body from Israel, unseasonal showers washing away wages of brick kiln workers, and more.

Telangana worker’s dead body brought home amid Israel-Iran ceasefire 

The body of Ravinder Revalla, a migrant worker from Telangana who had passed away due to a heart attack in Israel last month, was finally brought home on July 2, 2025, the Deccan Chronicle reported on July 3. 

Revalla, 57, was being treated for a heart condition at the Sourasky Medical Centre in Tel Aviv, Israel, when he passed away on June 15, 2025. His family had sought the Indian government's intervention to bring back his body.

The on-going crisis between Israel and Palestine and its allied countries, however, had delayed the repatriation process, which is usually completed in a week. Now, with a ceasefire between Israel and Iran in effect and flights out of Israel resuming operations, Revalla’s mortal remains were brought back home with assistance from the Indian Embassy in Israel. 

Telangana Israel Association president Soma Ravi was quoted in the Deccan Chronicle report as saying that Ravinder’s last rites were conducted on Wednesday. “We thank the Indian Embassy and officer Sridhar for their help in bringing him home,” he was quoted as saying, adding that all the required documents, including the death certificate, had been submitted in advance.

Unseasonal showers wash away brick kiln workers’ wages in UP

Brick kiln interstate migrant workers in western Uttar Pradesh are finding their income, and their lives, disrupted due to the recent unseasonal rains in India, according to a Deccan Herald report dated July 6, 2025. March to June are the peak performing months for brick kiln workers, due to perfect weather and high temperatures suitable for evenly drying of moulded bricks. The workers arrive from Bihar, Chhattisgarh and eastern Uttar Pradesh, enabling intensive labour operations. This year, however, several workers lost their wages for five days as the moulded bricks were ruined due to the rains. 

The March to June months’ stretch has also been lost due to unseasonal showers and hailstorms in the past few years. As per the report, 55% of Indian sub-districts experienced a 10% in southwest monsoon from 2012-2022 due to climate change.

"Everything got washed away. Now we're borrowing rice from the kiln owner. We'll repay with labour, but it means less money left to send home," Saroj, a 30-year-old brick moulder from Madhubani, Bihar, was quoted as saying in the Deccan Herald report. 

While most brick kiln workers are paid a per-piece wage of around 676 rupees per 1000 bricks, the report suggests that many received even less.

"They are often paid 500 rupees or lower. And if the bricks are destroyed by rain and not counted, they are not paid at all," Nirmal Gorana, convenor of the National Campaign Committee for the Eradication of Bonded Labour, was quoted as saying.

Several workers brought in by middlemen cannot go back as advances are offered, and their wages would be cut or halved. They borrow rations and medicines from the kiln owners, and pay off these debts in the next season. However, according to the Interstate Migrant Workmen Act, the workers are entitled to full payment of wages from recruitment till the end of service. 

Group for gig workers' welfare and social security schemes in Karnataka 

The Karnataka government has formed a working group to determine the quantum of fee to be levied for gig workers' welfare and other social security schemes, according to a Business World report dated July 2, 2025. The group includes trade leaders, representatives of e-commerce companies, legal experts and labour department officials.

The Karnataka Platform-based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Ordinance proposed levying 1-5% transaction charges that would affect private players such as Swiggy, Zomato, Ola and several others who employ or depend on gig workers. The exact welfare fee is yet to be determined. 

The group will outline the eligibility criteria for availing the scheme. The draft rules place emphasis on forming an internal dispute resolution committee to implement the framework. The committee aims to assist terminated gig workers within a week's timeframe.

A call to form a welfare board that has jurisdiction over occupational safety and health standards is also part of the rules. The board would consist of workers, representatives of the government and industry.

Centre flags irregularities in MGNREGS digital attendance system

The Union Rural Development Ministry on July 8, 2025, issued a 13-page note to all states and Union Territories regarding the misuse of the digital attendance system mandated for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). The digital attendance system was introduced nearly four years ago for MGNREGS. It has been mandated for the three years according to a report in The Hindu dated July 14, 2025. 

According to the report, the Central government discovered various ways in which the National Mobile Monitoring System (NMMS) platform for digital attendance was being misused, and is now being updated with four layers of checks to plug the holes. 

The ministry flagged various mismatches in the uploading of workers' photographs, gender composition and head count. Irrelevant or unrelated photographs were being uploaded, many cases of “photo-to-photo capturing instead of live work images”, the report stated. 

“This defeats the very purpose of introducing a digital attendance system,” Chakradhar Buddha, senior researcher, LibTech India, as per the report in The Hindu. 

WB migrant board slams deportation of Birbhum family, treatment of Bengali speakers

Trinamool Rajya Sabha MP Samirul Islam from West Bengal has lashed out at the state government over its deportation of Sweety Bibi, a permanent resident of Murarai in West Bengal’s Birbhum district. Bibi claims to have been deported to Bangladesh along with her five family members from Delhi’s Rohini, according to The Hindu’s report, dated July 19, 2025.

In a video message, she appealed to Chief Mamata Banerjee to help her return to India. The video message was shared by Chairperson of West Bengal Migrant Welfare Board and Rajya Sabha MP Samirul Islam. Ms. Bibi and her family were in Delhi for their livelihood. 

The MP added that this wasn't the first time West Bengal residents were pushed into Bangladesh by security agencies. Sharing the video, he questioned the government's actions, stating that their only crime was speaking Bengali in BJP-ruled Delhi.

Referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's recent speech in Durgapur on Bengali pride, Islam pointed out the contradiction between his claim that the BJP prioritizes Bengali identity, while the TMC threatens it through infiltration and fake identities, and the treatment of Bengali-speaking citizens.

The PM made the remarks on July 18, 2025, when he launched several development projects in West Bengal’s Durgapur and criticised Trinamool Congress over governance. 

Islam further shared another video of Nishikanta Biswas, a member of the Matua Community from Ranaghat, whose sons Manishankar and Nayan Biswas have been in police custody in Maharashtra for six months. They had travelled to Pune in search of work in January 2025, and despite providing Aadhar cards, voter IDs, and official Matua Mahasangha IDs signed by BJP MP Shantanu Thakur, the police had dismissed their documents and detained them on suspicion of being Bangladeshi immigrants.

Islam added that such incidents are troubling given the Matua community’s inclusion in Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which promises citizenship to persecuted non-Muslims migrants from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh who entered India before December 31, 2014. 

Compiled by Mansi Bhaktwani