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On Monday, hordes of migrants desperate to return home to Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal from Surat clashed with police and torched vehicles, reported The Times of India. Hundreds of migrant workers turned violent in Bengaluru after rumours spread that the temporary camp near the Bangalore International Exhibition Centre where they had gathered, was nothing but a quarantine facility. In the incident, four police personnel were attacked and a few police vehicles were damaged. The police then had to resort to lathicharge to rein in the restless workers who allegedly pelted stones at the cops.
In Ahmedabad too, it was reported that migrants ran from pillar to post on learning that they had to physically register themselves for the journey home and had to be dispersed by the police when too many gathered at the Collectorate. Mohammed Shakil Alalm, a construction worker from Katihar, Bihar, told TOI he was told by his fellow workers that migrants would be registered at the collectorate and taken to their destinations from Sabarmati railway station. “There was no such thing and I was shooed away. I do not have a job, nor money, so I do not know where to go for help,” Alam said.
Surat was already brimming with anger and Monday’s violence began when a large group, including women, who were already furious at being sent back from Gujarat’s borders on Friday night, started pelting stones and vandalizing vehicles in Vareli, a textile manufacturing cluster adjoining Surat. The police used at least 40 teargas shells and resorted to a lathicharge as the mob wasn’t relenting. Around 20 people were arrested for rioting.
Radhey Shyam Tripathi, a textile worker from Varanasi, said he would not return to Surat again. “Humko kutton ki tarah bhagaya gaya Dahod se (We were chased away like dogs from the Dahod border),” Tripathi said, adding, “We spent money from our own pockets to reach our native places. Still we faced humiliation and were sent back. Our crime is that we want to go home.” Girishanker Mishra, from Gaya in Bihar, said, “If this is the treatment we are getting in Gujarat, we will not return. We had a very humiliating experience at Dahod. They (cops) treated us like terrorists.”
The bus carrying Tripathi and 56 fellow workers was sent back from Dahod checkpost by the police. Migrants from UP and Bihar say they feel neglected when they see migrants from states like Jharkhand, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh going home by buses and trains.
In Valsad district too, hundreds of labourers had blocked the roads but later relented.
In Mumbai’s Kajupada police station in Saki Naka, Mohammad Hanif, a migrant from Uttar Pradesh’s Balrampur who was waiting there for five hours said, “There was such a crowd that the police hit us on our legs with sticks. They told us to leave and said they would not accept our forms today. This whole thing is a farce. Finally, the only way to get home will be on foot.” Many waiting outside Mumbai’s police stations were angry after they complained that their forms were rejected due to minor errors.
“I spent 10 hours getting a medical certificate yesterday. But police did not take the application saying there was some new form now,” said Altaf, a migrant worker in Mumbai. “My employee’s form was rejected because they said the surname was wrong. Another was rejected because the destination Banda district was not found,” said Imran Khan, a social worker from Sewree. DCP Pranay Ashok, though, said, “We are accepting whatever forms are being submitted, irrespective of the destination state.” He also refuted claims of a lathicharge in the area.
In Pune too, the police resorted to a “mild lathicharge” after a crowd of 500 – 600 migrants gathered at Warje police station to fill forms and blocked the road.
In Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu, a crowd of about 100 workers that had thronged the station to board trains going from Kerala to states in the north were made to move to a temporary camp at a municipal school to register themselves. The crowd here soon swelled to 5,000 people tired of waiting. In Vellore, a crowd of 200 migrant workers protested at the SP’s office to demand passes to leave the state. Though most workers wore masks, social-distancing norms were nowhere to be seen at Tiruppur station.
On Monday, the Ratanpur checkpoint on the Rajasthan-Gujarat border was chock-a-block with migrant workers for the eighth consecutive day. Long queues for registration and screening and fear of being put in quarantine are driving some migrant workers to try and sneak in through other routes, an official said.
Quarantining on return
While migrant workers are returning home, their movement has sparked another fear – that of taking the virus back home. A large chunk of those suffering with the coronavirus are asymptomatic and whoever is left out of testing by the government can add to the growing cases of the infection. TOI reported that fourteen migrant workers were kept under institutional quarantine since returning to their native places in Chhattisgarh, after they tested positive on Sunday.
The number of infections being carried undetected is probably very high as travelling across inter-state borders has begun. Karnataka and Rajasthan on Monday reported three new cases where the returnees had sneaked in without being screened.
The fresh cases in Chhattisgarh represent the largest spike, especially only after seven Covid-19 patients were said to be in hospital. Chhattisgarh’s Covid count now stands at 55. Before the 14 migrant workers, three returnees from Jharkhand had tested positive.
In Karnataka’s Mandya, two people tested positive just over 10 days after violating the lockdown to drive down to their village from Mumbai. Deputy Commissioner Venkatesh said they arrived in Karnataka along with some family members in the same car on April 23. Both individuals were shifted to isolation in Mandya Medical College.
Rajasthan also, braced for a potential spread of Covid-19 through migrant workers illegally coming in from Gujarat after a native of Kasba village in Dungarpur became the tribal district’s sixth positive case.
Officials said the patient had crossed over on April 17, after which someone reported him to the health authorities. He was put in institutional quarantine after being caught roaming about on April 23. His first report on April 24 was negative, but the second sample taken on Sunday came out positive. The village has been sealed. “Many migrant workers are walking back to Rajasthan from Gujarat, using country roads to skirt the border checkpoints,” district chief medical health officer Mahesh Parmar said.
A young, migrant labourer, Kamlesh Meena, who returned to his native village in Bhilwara, Rajasthan after walking 160 kms from Ajmer’s Kishangarh completed his mandatory 14-day quarantine on a makeshift platform built on a tree in his agricultural field outside the village, reported The Hindu.
After he returned home, there was a scuffle because his family wanted him to stay home, but villagers wanted him to go to the district hospital to get tested. The medical team from the Community Health Centre which collected his samples gave him the option of staying at a quarantine centre in Bhilwara. However, after a long debate it was decided that he would stay in the agricultural field, a km away from his home. The villagers erected a wooden platform on a tree, plastic sheets serving as its roof. A temporary ladder made of bamboo was placed beside the tree. His father Sagarmal went to the field twice every day to deliver food, water and essential items.
Speaking to The New Indian Express, Zilla Parisath Chief Executive Officer from Kurnool, Venkata Subbaiah, who is at the forefront of monitoring migrant issues, said that medical teams were conducting tests on all 39,000 migrants who had returned from Guntur. Nobody had been tested positive for the coronavirus yet.
In Bengaluru, all those who travelled by KSRTC buses were subjected to health checks in their respective districts and asked to adhere to quarantine strictly. Several teams have been entrusted with the task of ensuring that these people remain within their homes and do not break quarantine rules. These teams will be visiting their houses at odd hours and check their presence. In addition, some neighbours have also been asked to keep an eye, reported Daiji World.
State governments are seen readying facilities to quarantine migrant workers who are returning home in large numbers. The testing quantity and efficiency is what is going to now ensure that the virus is not carried into the homes of rural India.
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