Due to the lockdown, migrant labourers head back home

With Mumbai under lockdown, migrant labourers are heading back home which has his small and medium businesses in Dharavi.

Mumbai (Maharashtra):Lockdown has been declared due to increasing COVID cases. The lockdown has been declared since Wednesday. As a result, about 30 to 70 per cent of the migrant labourers in Dharavi have returned to their villages. The Dharavi area in Mumbai is home to a large number of migrant labourers. These labourers are now going to their village. Therefore, small and big businesses in Dharavi are closed at present.

Migrant labourers in Dharavi are mainly from the four states of Chhattisgarh, Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. These labourers do many menial jobs like selling Panipuri, Bhelpuri, sugarcane juice, and work as masons and construction workers. They go to their village during summer vacation and Diwali. But since the last year, due to the rise of Corona cases, the State has been under total lockdown. Bus and railway services were also discontinued.

As a result, all the workers were stranded in the city. At this time, the business has come to a standstill due to the lockdown and there is a picture of migrant traders and labourers going back to their respective villages for fear of closure of the district boundary.