Migrant worker COVID-19 exodus plunges India's factories into crisis

An acute shortage of workers has turned the roar of machines to a soft hum at a footwear factory near New Delhi, just one of thousands in India struggling to restart after an exodus of migrant workers during the virus lockdown.

India is slowly emerging from strict containment measures imposed in late March as leaders look to revive the battered economy, but manufacturers don't have enough workers to man the machinery.

The big cities - once an attractive destination for workers from poor, rural regions - have been hit by reverse migration as millions of labourers flee back to their far-flung home villages, some uncertain if they will ever return.

"Sixty percent of our labourers have gone back. How can we run a production unit with just one-third of our workforce?" asked Sanjeev Kharbanda, a senior executive with Aqualite Industries, which owns the footwear factory in the northern state of Haryana.

Kharbanda said the company's sports shoe unit had been sitting idle as there were no skilled workers to operate the high-tech machines.

"We are running just one shift now. The cost of production has gone up and our profits are going down," he said, a conveyor belt carrying semi-finished flip-flops running slowly in the background.

A non-operational conveyor belt as production slowed down at the Aqualite footwear factory in Bahadurgarh in the northern Indian state of Haryana.

Labourers packing shoes on a production line at the Aqualite footwear factory in Bahadurgarh in the northern Indian state of Haryana.

A non-operational conveyor belt as production slowed down at the Aqualite footwear factory. | In Gujarat state's Surat city - where 90 percent of the world's diamonds are cut and polished - many factories have been unable to open after more than two-thirds of workers fled, Surat diamond association president Babu Kathiriya told AFP.

The economy is forecast to grow at its slowest pace in 11 years, and analysts are bracing for a severe contraction in the current quarter.