How coronavirus has exposed the pain points of migration and globalisation

Rewind to the decade of the 90s. The was the era in which India was ushering in economic liberalisation and a catchphrase called globalisation began capturing political imagination the world over. National boundaries became blurred, economic integration and cross-border migration gathered momentum, as world leaders bought the globalisation story even before it began to play out.
Fast-forward to the present day. Suddenly, globalisation is no longer seen as the panacaea it was 25-30 years ago and migration, earlier regarded as a desirable social process that supported the cause of a global community, is now viewed with trepidation and fear. What caused this 180-degree turn in mindset?
Before we answer that question, let's take a quick look at some numbers. By one estimate, some 17 million Indians were living outside the country in 2017 and around 391,000 went abroad as unskilled migrants. According to the 2001 census, 259 million people migrated from one state to another and from village to village.
Every day, the country welcomes migrants into its fold while simultaneously seeing a stream of ethnic Indians moving overseas for work or to become global citizens. It is a typical cycle, albeit not necessarily a vicious one from the emigrant's point of view -- on the one hand, the desire to improve one's economic lot provides the stimulus to emigrate and on the other, financial ability to emigrate provides mobility to the mover. Cross-border movement of population promotes multi-culturalism, boosts economic growth and has been known to improve work ethic as well.

But there is the flip side to migration. For starters, it has the potential to radically change the demographics and culture of a nation, especially when the influx of foreigners is complemented by an outflow of the ethnic population. The other aspect, which has come into focus recently due to the spread of the coronavirus, is the potential of the accepting nation to import diseases from the incoming foreigner or returning Indian. Everybody's uncle will tell you that the Coronavirus spread from Chinese migrants to the populations in their host countries, and that disease made inroads into India due to the influx of Indians returning home from abroad and foreigners visiting the country. There is little argument against the theory that entrepreneurs, businessman, employed public, and entertainers who travel to various parts of the world have contributed a lot in dissemination of this malady in India. This is especially true in the case of semi-skilled, unskilled Indian migrants returning from the Middle East.