Approximately, 10 lakh migrants working in the city of Mumbai had applied to leave for their hometowns. Roughly about 6.5 lakh have left on trains so far while 1.5 lakh have used other modes of transport. The remaining two lakhs are still waiting to leave.
As per police officials, applications to leave Mumbai have decreased now. Earlier the applications used to be more than a lakh per week asking to leave the city. The Indian Railways so far has ferried over 50 lakh migrant workers through 3,736 'Shramik Special' trains since May 1, as per official data. Of these, 3,157 have already reached their destination.
The top five states and Union Territories from where maximum trains have originated are Gujarat (979), Maharashtra (695), Punjab (397), Uttar Pradesh (263) and Bihar (263). These Shramik Special Trains were terminated in various states across the country. The top five states where maximum trains have terminated their journey are Uttar Pradesh (1520), Bihar (1296), Jharkhand (167), Madhya Pradesh (121), Odisha (139).
In recent developments, the district collector had informed the Bombay High Court that over 50,000 stranded migrants had been transported to their home states from Nagpur earlier this month amidst the COVID-19 lockdown. The Nagpur district collector and city police commissioner were responding to a suo moto petition taken up by the high court in order to highlight the hardships faced by migrants as a consequence of the lockdown. The collector, in his affidavit, had stated that people, who were found walking on highways in order to reach their home states, were intercepted by the police and put in buses arranged by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC).
The affidavit further asserted that thousands of ration kits and food kits were distributed to migrants, daily-wage labourers and needy persons across the district in order to safeguard the people.
Share
Tweet
