Millions in migrant camps battle despair about uncertain future
Workers complain of poor facilities and worry about loss of incomes
MUMBAI/LUCKNOW/PATNA: In the past week, Ajay Mahto and Sanjay Mahor have learnt the value of patience.
A truck driver, Mahto was in Punjab’s Ludhiana city when sweeping restrictions were announced to stop the spread of Covid-19. On the second day of the lockdown, he and some other stranded workers hitched a ride on a truck to get back to their villages in Bihar.
But the vehicle was intercepted in Patna the next day, and the workers sent to a government school that was turned into a migrant shelter. With no friends or family around, Mahto spends his days in a small room with strangers. “My village is just 20 km from here. I can feel my village but cannot go,” he said.
A high school dropout, Mahto had never seen the inside of a classroom before. “Now, I sleep on a bench every night,” said Mahto, pointing at the shabby classroom that is now home to six migrant workers.
More than 1,700km away in Maharashtra, Mahor was caught by police officers on the same day as Mahto while walking back with a group from Mumbai to his village in Madhya Pradesh.
He was put in a camp in Mumbai on March 27. Unlike the camp in Patna – where workers are allowed to walk outside and bathe in nearby rivers – no one is permitted to step out of the Mumbai camp. “It is like a prison,” said Mahor, adding that the same meal is served to workers every day. “My wife is pregnant. I wanted to be with her,” he said.
The toilets are not clean and four people share a small room, said his fellow camp dweller, Mohammed Asif Sajeebul, a rickshaw puller from Mumbra.
Mahto, Mahor and Sajeebul are three of the roughly 10.55 million people who are currently living in 22,567 shelters that were set up to disperse the waves of migrant workers across India who were trying to get back home after the lockdown was imposed at midnight on March 25. The numbers were part of a document submitted by the government to the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
Only a few of them were able to reach their villages. Many are either in shelter homes set up at check posts or big towns, or quarantine homes near their villages.
Authorities swung into action to provide them food and shelter and to monitor their health. Around 8.5 million people have been given food by government with the help of non-government organisations in these camps, the home ministry told the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
But despite the arrangements, many workers are desperate for their families, the threat of Covid-19 and their financial future.
In a camp in Patna, Ganghara Panchayat Bawan, labourers complained of no masks, soaps, sanitisers and the stench in toilets. “I am a poor person. But, still toilet in my village is better than this,” said a labourer, Udit Raj, who paid ~1,800 to a truck driver in Howrah in West Bengal.
He and 44 other labourers hid themselves in the truck container and travelled for more than 24 hours to reach Patna. He said the probability of catching Covid-19 in the shelter home was more than in his village.
An Asha [Accredited Social Health Activist] worker, Anita Devi has been tasked with monitoring the body temperatures of the workers every day but said she did not have masks or sanitiser –two of the most basic requirements to protect one’s self from the infection. “We are on the mercy of God here,” she said.
The area’s block development officer and in-charge of the camps, Devendra Kumar, denied the charge. “If people steal them what can we do,” he said.
In UP’s Badholi, Tauheed Ahmed, 45, a migrant who owned a juice stall in Delhi, said he was adhering to rules at the government senior secondary school he was staying in at present.
He claimed he walked the first 250 km from Delhi to Badholi in Bahraich district and was lucky to get a lift for the rest of the distance. The distance between Delhi and Bahraich is 680 km.
Dr Nikhil Singh, superintendent doctor, said a medical team was closely monitoring the area.
“We send a doctor every two days, and our village level health volunteers are monitoring the migrants,” he said.
In another tin-roofed labour camp, opposite high-rises in Lucknow’s affluent Gomti Nagar area, workers speculated when the lockdown will end. Most of the people housed in this camp are contractual labourers, mechanics, masons and electricians who were hired to construct a highrise complex in the vicinity.
Monu Mondal a resident of West Bengal who worked as a plumber on the construction site, attempted to travel back but was stuck after the lockdown. “We were not paid anything before the lockdown. I don’t have any money left,” he said, adding that many of the labourers left the camp looking for work in the city. “Some are selling vegetables.”
With many government employees engaged in Covid-19 duties, people from different walks of life are managing these camps – migrant worker Mohammad Hasib in Badholi, block development officer Devendra Kumar in Patna, and social worker Gurmeet Singh in Ludhiana are some of them.
Hasib spends his day checking the health status of migrants and managing activities related to sanitisation of the village, and coordinating with authorities.
“Over 2,000 migrants have returned to their homes in Badholi and all are under home quarantine,” said Hasib, whose daughter-in-law Salma is the village head.
“I take care of everything, arranging food, monitoring their health and providing necessary hygiene,” said Hasib, who returned from Delhi, where he runs a fruit and vegetable juice shop, about two months ago.
Kumar has been made in-charge of running three camps for workers in Patna. “These days
I go home for just a couple of hours to sleep. I eat same food as the workers. This helps to ensure some quality when the supplies are dwindling,” he said.
Singh used to manage the kitchen at the local gurdwara. Now at a camp for labourers in Ludhiana, Singh’s day starts at 5 am with a visit to the local market to source essentials.
“There were about 1,000 persons in the camp when the exodus started after March 25. We arranged everything for them .... Now, most of the labourers have either gone to UP or Bihar or have returned to their rented accommodation,” he said.
In Mahto’s former workplace, Ludhiana, there is just one per cent occupancy in 50 camps set up for labourers, said the local administration.
Ashok, who works in a cycle parts manufacturing unit, said living in factory run homes was better than the shelter. “We have our friends there and the factory owner says that some work will resume soon,” he said, adding that the factory owners have arranged for their food. Others are worried about their future.