A Sikh worker died in a farm accident but Indians are risking it all for life of abuse in Italy

Jasveer Kaur last saw her son pre-pandemic. Now the Punjabi mother of three has only memories, faded photos – and stories of a freak farm accident that ended his life and shed light on the grip that gangmasters exert over Italy’s migrant labour market.

Melon picking for a pittance was not the dream that Satnam Singh had in mind when he left his village in northern India for a new life in Italy, working the marshy farmland south of Rome.

Back-breaking jobs, measly wages, long hours – and then the fatal mechanical accident that severed his arm and short life.

“I used to tell him to video-call me and show where he was working. He used to say, ‘Mother, do not stress about me’,” Kaur said, swallowing sobs outside her home in Chand Nawan village.

Singh, 31, died in June after losing his arm in the greenhouse where he worked in Agro Pontino, an area close to Rome where wheat, grapes and other fruit are intensively farmed, much of it by illegal migrants from India and eastern Europe.

His death has opened a window onto the plight of Italy’s estimated 450,000 illegal migrants, with thousands of farms heavily dependent on men like Singh to plant, harvest then process crops.

Context has traced Singh’s steps, explored...

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