Gender dynamics during COVID-19 and its impact on South Asian women migrants in GCC countries

Abstract

ABSTRACT The feminisation of migration was already an established phenomenon much before the COVID-19 pandemic struck the world and disrupted the migration pattern. It not only disturbed existing equilibrium but also rewrote a new order of gendered migration. It imposed severe constraints on mobility by closing the borders of sovereign nation-states, imposing lockdowns and putting populations under quarantine. Migrant workers, especially women were adversely affected by these restrictions and became easy victims of economic, social and structural inequalities. Under these observations, the research paper analyses the magnitude and patterns of gender dynamics among South Asian women in the Gulf. It also examines how a global health crisis reinforces existing gendered socialisation and creates new gender biases which impact women migrant workers disproportionately. The research article also discusses roles and responsibilities, patterns of expenditure, remittances etc of migrating women from South Asia to the Gulf and the changes which have occurred.