The migrant worker

What happened in Delhi on Saturday was probably avoidable. Thousands of migrant workers working in the national capital who hail from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, wanted to go back to their respective villages. The reason was simple: with no work and thus no income because of the nationwide lockdown, they were heading towards starvation. Thus the only option left was to return home, where they would at least have a place to stay and a community to support. While movement of trains, buses and all kinds of transport had come to a halt because of the nationwide lockdown – the world’s largest – thousands of people, mostly young male day labourers, but also families, had resorted to commuting on foot in the past three or four days heading for home. They included construction workers, taxi drivers, domestic helps, cart-pullers, vendors, housekeeping workers and others engaged in the informal sector employment. While the three-week lockdown took off pretty well barring a few violations here and there, the sudden rush that Delhi witnessed in the past couple of days has suddenly increased the possibility of the Coronavirus spreading into the community across central India in the next few weeks. Finally, the authorities sent a fleet of buses to the outskirts of Delhi on Saturday to meet an exodus of migrant workers desperately trying to reach their native villages. The government of Uttar Pradesh, which borders Delhi, sent a fleet of public and private buses with room for 52,000 people to a highway overpass area on the Delhi border where thousands were stranded. The Central government soon issued directions for effective sealing of district and state borders, and state governments were directed to ensure that there was no movement of people across cities or on highways and that only movement of goods should be allowed. The Centre also asked the State governments for making adequate arrangements for food and shelter of poor and needy people including migrant labourers at the place of their work. The Centre has made sufficient funds available to the states for this purpose. Guwahati too has several thousand daily wagers and others hailing from other districts who have been stuck with no money and no food since the lockdown began. These people can be easily identified with the help of the unnayan samitis that most localities have, with the police taking the initiative in the absence of an elected body of the Guwahati Municipal Corporation. The four hon’ble MLAs whose constituencies cover the city should also step in.