COVID-19 and Echoes of Divide: A Political Economy Study of the Coronavirus Crisis Through Puja Changoiwala’s Homebound

Abstract

The ‘Coronavirus Pandemic’ led to a worldwide lockdown that confined millions inside their homes. Among frontline workers like medical professionals, shopkeepers, and police, people who were forced out of their homes were informal migrant workers. Those who had left their homes to work in big cities for better prospects in life set out on a reverse journey to their rural homes. Puja Changoiwala’s novel Homebound (2021) presents a heart-wrenching account of the displacement of a migrant family from their work land to homeland. Critical textual analysis of Changoiwala’s novel with Marxist theoretical foundations lays bare the socio-economic inequality-based class division and its relation with the experiences of health and illness among the population. A close reading of characters using literary trauma theory and contemporary trauma concepts reveal the biting impact of the unforgiving coronavirus with the sudden lockdown and the personal trauma they experience, given their diaspora status within their own country. The study unveils the differences in patterns of disease, response to disease, and the eventuality of disease between people from lower socio-economic classes and those who are privileged with more favorable circumstances. The importance of the study lies in highlighting the representation of the struggle and pain of the ‘citymakers’ while navigating the risk of the virus and preventive policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through the political economy lens on the double displacement of migrant workers, the study also sheds light on the underpinnings of political and social dynamics during the crisis.