Buses with name boards in Hindi, apart from Malayalam and English, something that was unheard of till a few years ago, has become a familiar sight in the city. In the latest mode to attract migrant labourers, whose population is mounting day by day in the city, Hindi name boards find places in more and more city buses. B u s e s p l y i n g t o Mankavu, Perumanna, P u t h o o r m a d o m , Cheruvannur, Olavanna, Feroke, Mavoor and Thiruvannoor, where the work places of labourers from West Bengal, Assam and other north-eastern states are located, are mainly using Hindi boards to wo o N o r t h I n d i a n commuters. Now, Hindi name boards find a place in buses to Kuttiady, Perinthalmanna, Palakkad and Kannur, which operate services from the mofusil bus station. With the number of migrant labourers working in the city to eke out a living going up, boards in Hindi find a place in many small eateries and mobile phone shops located in various places as well. Until a decade ago, the only migrant workers were those from Tamil Nadu. But now, unskilled and semiskilled workers from Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Orissa, West Bengal and the North-East are filling that key vacuum in the district’s workforce. “Many migrant labourers working in various construction sites in the city travel in private buses and the Hindi boards help them to identify them quickly,” says Radhakrishnan, state secretary of Private Bus Operators Organisation, adding that earlier Tamilians were in the place of North Indian workers. According to the data available with the city police, which has collected the details of migrant labourers in the city, 2,485 workers from outside the state are working in various sectors such as construction sites, hotels, bakery, barber shops and the footwear industry in Kozhikode. Chevayur tops in migrant labours’ population, with 501 people. Areas such as Feroke, Elathur, Nallalam, Mavoor and Medical College have also recorded a high settlement of North Indian workers, with 247, 224, 219 and 220 people respectively. Besides these, people from Orissa and West Bengal earn a livelihood from fishing jobs at Puthiyappa, Elathur and Beypore areas. However, the actual number may go up as these people always keep moving and refrain from appearing before government authorities owing to fear and language problems.