Ipsa Tripathy
Bhubaneswar: Every year, as the paddy harvest ends and the fields of western Odisha turn dry and pale, families begin to leave their villages. They pack a few clothes, steel plates, blankets and sacks of rice before heading to the nearest bus stop or railway station. At Kantabanji in Balangir district, the movement is familiar. The town has long been known as a major labour migration hub in western Odisha. For many families, the journey is not a search for a better life so much as a response to the lack of one at home.
The seasonal migration usually begins in October or November. Families return around June or July, after spending much of the year working at brick kilns in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, or at construction sites closer to home. Their labour helps build India’s expanding towns and cities. Yet the families themselves often leave behind unfinished harvests, interrupted schooling and debts that follow them from one season to the next. This system is known locally as Dadan.
A word that carries a debt
Dadan refers to an advance payment made to a labourer before work begins. A sardar, or labour contractor, visits villages before the migration season and offers money to families who agree to work at a kiln for several months. The advance can be difficult to refuse. A poor harvest, a medical emergency, a wedding or an outstanding loan may have left a household with few options.
The arrangement appears straightforward: take the money, travel to the kiln and work until the advance has been settled. But the terms can become difficult to track once the family reaches its destination. Workers may have no written record of the original advance, the wages earned or deductions made along the way. Without clear accounts, it becomes difficult to know what has been paid and what is still owed.
Researchers have described Dadan as a form of debt-linked migration that can lead to bonded labour. The distinction matters. Migration for work is not automatically forced labour, and an advance alone does not establish that a worker is bonded. The danger arises when debt, coercion, restricted freedom to leave or other exploitative conditions trap workers in employment they cannot freely refuse or end. India’s Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1976, provides the legal framework for identifying and abolishing bonded labour.
The Odisha Labour Directorate has acknowledged the role of advances and informal recruitment networks in the migration cycle. When recruitment is poorly documented and workers lack access to reliable grievance mechanisms, families can find themselves at a serious disadvantage long before they reach the kiln.
How many people leave?
The exact scale of migration from Odisha remains difficult to establish. The figures cited by government agencies, researchers and civil society groups differ because many workers travel through informal recruitment networks and are not captured in official registers.
The Periodic Labour Force Survey for 2020–21 has been cited in discussions of migration from Odisha, while civil society estimates have placed inter-state migration from the state at around 10 lakh people. Estimates also suggest that substantial numbers of workers from western Odisha travel to brick kilns, often with their spouses and children. These figures should be treated with care: migration estimates may cover different populations, periods and types of work, making direct comparisons difficult.
What is clear is that migration has become a recurring livelihood strategy in parts of Balangir, Nuapada, Kalahandi and neighbouring districts. For many households, leaving is not an isolated decision made in one bad year. It is part of an annual cycle shaped by agricultural uncertainty, limited local employment and the need for cash.
When climate uncertainty reaches the household
Dadan is often described as a story of poverty and labour exploitation. In western Odisha, it is also closely connected to the risks of rain-fed agriculture. Many farmers depend heavily on the monsoon, and the timing and distribution of rainfall can determine whether a season provides enough food and income to keep a household afloat.
The climate picture is not simply that rainfall is disappearing. Research examining rainfall in the Kalahandi, Balangir and Koraput region from 1980 to 2017 found a statistically significant increasing trend in monsoon rainfall. Other analyses of extreme rainfall events in Odisha have identified increases in heavy-rainfall episodes in some districts, including Balangir and Nuapada. These findings do not mean every village has experienced the same trend. They do, however, highlight an important distinction: total seasonal rainfall tells only part of the story.
Rain that arrives in a few intense bursts may run off quickly or cause flooding, while a long dry spell later in the season can leave crops short of moisture. For a farmer, the interval between rainfall events can matter as much as the seasonal total. A monsoon can bring substantial rain and still fail to deliver it when the crop needs it.
Research on agriculture in the KBK region has linked rainfall variability and drought risk to crop productivity. In Balangir, analyses have also identified factors such as rainfall variation, high temperatures, drought and pest attacks as important influences on agricultural performance. The effects are compounded where irrigation is limited, crop insurance does not provide timely relief or households have little savings to fall back on.
When a crop fails, the consequences reach beyond the field. A family may struggle to repay a loan, buy food, pay school expenses or cover the next medical emergency. An advance from a labour contractor can suddenly seem like the only available source of cash. Climate stress does not automatically cause bonded labour, but it can deepen the financial insecurity that makes exploitative recruitment harder to refuse.
One farmer from Nuapada, quoted in research by the Population Council, described the connection plainly: without rain there is no crop, and drought damages both livelihoods and children’s education. For families caught in this cycle, climate uncertainty is not an abstract projection. It is a question of whether they can remain at home after the harvest.
Research by the International Institute for Environment and Development has also linked slow-onset climate hazards, including drought, with greater risks of distress migration. Its findings on exploitative labour conditions among migrants in drought-affected parts of neighbouring Jharkhand underline a wider concern: when people leave under financial pressure, they may be more vulnerable to unsafe work, withheld wages and debt bondage.
Life at the kiln
The hardships faced by migrant workers have emerged repeatedly in rescue operations. In one major operation in Telangana’s Nizamabad district, authorities rescued 518 workers from brick kilns, including more than 200 children, according to media reports. Survivors described long working hours and being paid through grocery vouchers rather than cash.
In Thiruvallur district of Tamil Nadu, another reported rescue involved 328 bonded labourers from Odisha, including 106 children. Reports described long working days and extremely low payments. In a separate case near Tirupati, 117 workers were rescued after reportedly receiving an advance of ₹10,000, with families describing payments that were inadequate for their needs.
These cases do not describe every kiln or every migrant family. They do show the risks that can arise when recruitment is informal, wage records are missing and workers have little power to challenge their employers. Long hours, uncertain payment and debt deductions can leave families unable to save enough to return home or refuse another season of work.
Children are especially vulnerable. When families migrate for most of the school year, education is often disrupted. Some children travel with their parents and may be drawn into work; others struggle to resume their studies after returning. The consequences can extend well beyond a single season, limiting opportunities and making it harder for the next generation to escape the same cycle.
The human cost also appears in official reporting. Odisha’s government has reported migrant worker deaths and rescues from distress over recent years, with western districts among those affected. Such figures require careful interpretation because causes and circumstances vary, but they underline the need for stronger protection before workers leave, while they are employed elsewhere and when they return.
What is being tried?
Odisha has introduced seasonal hostels to help children remain in school while their parents migrate. These facilities have operated in districts including Balangir, Nuapada, Kalahandi and Bargarh. They offer an important form of support, but their reach and conditions matter. Where places are insufficient or facilities are stretched, some children may still migrate with their families and lose months of schooling.
Rural employment programmes can also reduce the pressure to leave, provided work is available when households need it and wages arrive on time. The International Institute for Environment and Development’s research has found an association between access to an MGNREGA job card and a lower likelihood of distress migration. But a job card alone cannot provide security if work is unavailable or payment is delayed. For a household facing an immediate shortage of food or cash, an advance from a contractor may appear more dependable than a promise of employment that has yet to materialise.
There are examples of families finding alternatives. In Belpara block of Balangir, watermelon cultivation helped some former migrant workers earn locally, and the approach was reported to have spread to other families. Such examples are not a universal solution: farming still depends on water, land, markets and the ability to absorb financial risk. But they show why investment in locally viable livelihoods matters.
The state has also announced development initiatives in migration-prone villages and efforts to strengthen worker protection. The challenge is to turn these measures into reliable support on the ground: timely wages, accessible social protection, transparent recruitment, accurate worker registration and effective action against exploitative contractors and employers. Migrant workers should also be able to access essential welfare services when they cross state borders.
A climate question, not only a labour question
Migration itself is not the problem. People have always moved in search of work, and money earned elsewhere can help families build homes, pay school fees and meet everyday needs. The deeper question is whether people are able to choose when and where they work, or whether a failed harvest and an urgent debt leave them with no realistic alternative.
Dadan takes shape where agricultural uncertainty meets financial vulnerability and weak labour protection. Rainfall variability can weaken a household’s income; debt can force it to seek an advance; and an opaque recruitment arrangement can turn that advance into a source of control. None of these links is inevitable, but together they can create a cycle that is difficult to break.
Reducing the risks requires action on several fronts: better access to irrigation and climate-resilient farming, crop insurance that responds when losses occur, rural employment that pays on time, schools that remain accessible during migration seasons, and strict enforcement of labour laws at destination sites. Workers also need written wage records, clear contracts and a safe way to seek help without fear of losing their earnings or freedom.
As the migration season begins, families will once again leave Kantabanji and other towns across western Odisha. Some will travel to earn money by choice. Others will go because staying home has become financially impossible. Whether more families can remain by choice next year will depend on what changes before the next harvest fails.