Migration Streams and Their Consequences in India

Migration is the movement of people from one place to another. The place they leave is the place of origin. The place they move to is the place of destination.

What happens at each end?

The place of origin shows a decrease in population. The place of destination shows an increase.

Who is an emigrant and who is an immigrant?

Migrants who move out of a place are emigrants. Migrants who move into a place are immigrants. The same person is both, depending on which end you look from.

How long can migration last?

Migration may be permanent, temporary or seasonal.

The four streams are named by where people start and where they end. Each stream joins a rural or urban origin to a rural or urban destination.

Which are the four?

• Rural to rural.
• Rural to urban.
• Urban to urban.
• Urban to rural.

How can you remember them?

Read each as “from, then to”. The first word is the origin. The second word is the destination.

Is there a stream ranking?

NCERT only lists the four streams. It does not rank them. So treat any claim about the biggest stream as a Census question, not an NCERT fact.

Push factors make the place of origin seem less attractive. Pull factors make the place of destination seem more attractive.

Which push factors are listed?

They are unemployment, poor living conditions, political turmoil, unpleasant climate, natural disasters, epidemics and socio-economic backwardness.

Which pull factors are listed?

They are better job opportunities and living conditions, peace and stability, security of life and property, and pleasant climate.

How do you tell them apart?

Ask where the cause sits. A cause at home is a push. A cause at the destination is a pull.

The Harris-Todaro model of 1970 answers this. It says migration depends on expected income, not on the actual wage.

What does expected income mean?

Expected income compares what a migrant hopes to earn in the city with what they can earn at home. The city wage alone does not decide the move.

Is the move still rational?

Yes. The paper says rural-urban migration can be economically rational even when urban unemployment is high. This holds if expected urban income exceeds expected rural income.

Why does this matter for exams?

It links two ideas. Unemployment in the city does not stop the flow, because migrants judge expected income.

The EAC-PM paper lists three frameworks for studying migration. Each one explains a different part of the story.

What did Ravenstein observe?

Ernest George Ravenstein (1834 to 1913) made nine observations. Four of them matter most here. Long-distance migrants move mainly for economic reasons. Rural residents tend to be more migratory than urban residents. Working-age males are more likely to migrate than other groups. Migration often happens gradually, which he called step-migration.

What is the Lewis model?

Sir Arthur Lewis proposed it in 1954. It says labour shifts over time from traditional sectors such as agriculture to the modern industrial sector. Agriculture has low productivity and low wages. The modern sector has higher productivity and better wages.

How do the three ideas fit together?

Ravenstein describes who moves. Lewis describes which sector workers move towards. Harris and Todaro explain why people still move when city jobs are scarce.

The Census 2011 counted 45,57,87,621 migrants. This counts all reasons, all lengths of stay and all ages.

What is the migration rate?

The rate stood at 37.64 per cent in Census 2011. The EAC-PM paper estimates it has fallen to 28.88 per cent by 2023.

Why did it fall?

The authors say migration appears to be slowing. They suggest better conditions and opportunities at the places of origin. This is a hypothesis, not a Census count.

What does the count include?

The 2011 figure includes people who moved within their own state. It is not only inter-state movement.

The EAC-PM paper reproduces a Census 2011 table of migrants. It splits the numbers by sex, by rural or urban origin and by reason for moving.

How many men and women migrated?

The table counts 14,61,45,967 male migrants and 30,96,41,654 female migrants. Women are the larger group. This fits the fact that marriage is one of the Census reasons for moving.

How many came from rural and urban areas?

A total of 29,51,14,410 migrants came from rural areas. Another 10,63,55,920 came from urban areas. Rural origin is the larger group.

Who moved for work or business?

The paper adds work and business together as economic reasons. Work or employment accounts for 4,14,22,917 migrants. Business accounts for 35,90,487. Together they make 4,50,13,404. Men are 3,76,99,844 of that total and women are 73,13,560.

How recent are the moves?

In the same table, 7.48 per cent of all migrants had moved within the last one year.

Worked example: how do you read the table?

Start with the total of 45,57,87,621 migrants. Women are 30,96,41,654 of them. That is more than two in every three migrants. Men are the other 14,61,45,967.

Now look only at economic reasons. The total is 4,50,13,404, and men are 3,76,99,844 of it. That is about five in every six. Women are 73,13,560.

Put the two readings side by side. Women lead among all migrants, but men lead among those who moved for work or business. The gap is the reason column. The Census also lists marriage, birth and moving with the household as reasons.

Why must you read the reason column?

A question on “who migrates” can mean two different things. If it asks about all migrants, women lead in the 2011 table. If it asks about work migrants, men lead. Read the reason before you choose.

Now you try

Which group is larger in the table: female migrants or male work migrants? Female migrants are larger, at 30,96,41,654 against 3,76,99,844 male economic migrants. Check that the two groups answer different questions.

Five states account for about 48 per cent of all outbound migrants. They are Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.

Which states receive the most?

Five states also account for about 48 per cent of all incoming migrants. They are Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. Both counts include within-state movement.

What about inter-state flows?

The main origin states for inter-state migration are Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and abroad. The main destination states are Maharashtra, Delhi, Gujarat, West Bengal and Haryana.

Do most migrants go far?

No. The paper notes that most migrants tend to move close to their origin states.

Marriage is one of the Census reasons for moving, along with work, business, education, birth and moving with the household. Many of the women counted as marriage migrants may now be in the workforce.

What is a remittance?

A remittance is money a migrant sends back to the family in the home area.

Why do remittances matter?

The paper says labour remittances are a significant part of rural household income at the place of origin. It adds that most rural migrants keep a strong attachment to their rural home.

What do remittances change?

Previous studies, it says, found that remittances from out-migrants have a significant impact on socio-economic development in the areas of origin.

• Rural-to-urban is not the same as the largest stream by volume. NCERT does not rank the streams.
• A cause at home is a push factor. A cause at the destination is a pull factor.
• The Harris-Todaro model uses expected income, not the actual wage.
• The 2011 migrant count includes within-state movers, not only inter-state ones.
• The fall to 28.88 per cent is an estimate, not a Census count.

What was asked in CAPF (ACs) 2021?

Question 35 asked about pull factors of migration. View CAPF (ACs) 2021 paper, Q35 →

What is the memory hook?

Four streams, push from home, pull from afar, expected income decides.