Migrant labourers willing to return home from Haryana will be sent back

The Haryana government said that the migrant workers who are willing to travel back to their native land would be ferried through 5,000 buses and 100 trains. The state government will bear the entire cost of their transportation.

Chandigarh: More migrant workers willing to return home would be sent back to their native states within next seven days through 5,000 buses and 100 trains with the Haryana government bearing the entire cost of their transportation, an official said on Friday.

He said while the migrant workers from Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and eastern Uttar Pradesh would be sent on 100 Shramik Special trains, those belonging to nearby areas like western Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Uttarakhand will be sent by 5,000 buses.

After the announcement by Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar that every stranded migrant worker will be sent back to their home states, 23,452 of them have so far been sent back home free of cost by various trains and buses arranged by the state government during the past three days, the official said in a statement.

The statement said as many as 13,347 migrant workers have been sent to Uttar Pradesh whereas 3,133 of them have been sent to Uttarakhand and 3,593 to Bihar, the statement said.

Similarly, 2,549 migrant labourers have been sent to Madhya Pradesh, 435 to Rajasthan, 221 to Punjab, 54 to Himachal Pradesh, 46 to Kerala, 32 to Assam, 23 to Maharashtra and 19 to Gujarat, it added.

The first Shramik Special train from Haryana carrying 1,200 migrant workers who were stranded in the state due to the coronavirus-led lockdown, had left for Katihar in Bihar from Hisar railway station on Wednesday.

The Haryana government has also launched a web portal where migrant workers in the state willing to return to their native places can register themselves.

PTI Report