Plight of the Donkey Routes

Photo by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@sebastiengoldberg?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash">Sébastien Goldberg</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com/photos/people-walking-on-beach-during-daytime-AW5MxlFDVzc?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash">Unsplash</a>

Have you watched the movie “In Time”, a 2011 Sci-fi Action-packed movie starring Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried along with Cillian Murphy and many others, if you haven’t, you should.

In brief, it is about a future where people stop ageing after 25 and in order to stay alive, they have to buy time as a currency, in such a world the rich are almost immortal while the poor barely manage to buy time either through working for it or by borrowing or stealing it. It also shows the stark difference in societies in which the rich lived when the character Will (played by Justin) enters New Greenwich (the richest time zone) while on the run after being accused of murder and is suspected of not belonging there because of his rushed behaviour, and the story goes on.

But if we think about it and remove all the science fiction parts, there won’t be much difference between our current society and the one portrayed in that movie. One must ask why you feel like that?

Well, I’ll come to that after explaining what a “Donkey Route” is:

A donkey route is basically referred to a method where people from poor and underdeveloped countries migrate through various countries with a lenient visa policy to reach their dream destinations i.e. countries like US, UK, European countries etc.

But the journey is not so easy, they are often caught by authorities, cheated by fraud agents or worse die on the way.

In January 2022, a family of 4 members originally from Gandhinagar, Gujarat died on the way while crossing the US-Canada border in the peak winters, they had decided to cross the border on foot in the peak winters, but they couldn’t make it.

And there are many such cases, not one or two, but many. According to the latest US Customs and Border Protection data from November 2022 to September 2023, up to 96,917 Indians were arrested while crossing illegally into the US.

Why do they do it? Why are they so desperate to leave their home countries and travel illegally even if it means risking their lives?

There can be a lot of explanations ranging from loss of opportunities at their native places to a search for a better life at their dream destinations. Also, some social factors add to the cause, like seeing someone from their own social circle living a high standard of living in a foreign nation while they find themselves barely managing to make ends meet.

Now, who is responsible for all this?

Is it their own fault for taking the illegal routes even after knowing the consequences? or is it the government’s fault for not providing them with enough opportunities at home?

As for me, the latter sounds more responsible than the former one. If they had those opportunities to break the social strata and rise, the numbers would have been much less than it is today. There would still be migration, but it would surely not have been a desperate plight but rather a willful choice.

- Reshu Kumar

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