WAYANAD: Jharkhand native Babu Lal Sen, 32, came to Mundakkai in January with his wife Devanthi and daughter Anitha with the dream of earning enough money to construct a house back home. Now, Babu and his family are desperate to return to their village after having escaped the fury of Tuesday’s landslide by a whisker.
Currently lodged at a relief camp in Meppadi, he said 35 migrant workers at the tea plantation were staying with their families at the estate lane in Mundakkai.
“We heard a blast-like sound. The ground was trembling. That was followed by slush flowing into our house. Within no time, water reached waist high and we quickly moved to a higher ground. And we saw houses crumbling. From there, we were shifted to the estate office located on a hilltop. Later, we were moved to the relief camp,” Sen said.
Babu and family were recruited by a Bihar native Upender, who is now missing.
“Five of the migrant workers who lived in the lane houses are still missing. We came here to make money to build a house. Now we don’t even have the money to return to Jharkhand. We have lost all that we earned. We request the government to make arrangements for our return to our native place,” said his wife, Devanthi.
Similar is the plight of 25-year-old Uttar Pradesh native Prakash, who came to work at the Mundakkai estate a year ago. “We also have people from Bihar, Assam and West Bengal. We don’t know how many of them are alive. I haven’t been able to even speak to my family members so far,” Prakash said.