Millions of migrant labourers in all of India’s cities, living under temporary tents and without a house of their own, did not know where to live or how to live from March 25 morning onwards. Tens of thousands of them started walking back to their native villages hundreds of miles away. They found themselves unwanted on the roads; they had no food to eat, no water to drink. Children, pregnant mothers were among those walking caravans who will figure in future histories of India. We know that most of them would be Dalits, OBCs and Adivasis; along with a few poor from otherwise privileged castes. The first phase of the lockdown ended, ironically, on April 14—the 129th birth anniversary of Ambedkar. And Prime Minister Modi was addressing the nation again, at 10 am, as I was writing this article.