LUCKNOW: All the efforts to bring relief to the deprived and poor during the lockdown seem meaningless as long as the ‘long walk’ of migrants covering thousands of kilometres continues.
While a group of 150 migrant labourers from Telangana and Pune was stopped in Kanpur on Friday, 49 migrants belonging to UP were caught in Maharajganj when they were hiding under the tarpaulin cover in a truck coming from Pune. The truck driver was arrested and the migrants were quarantined in a local school.
A group of 150 migrant labourers on way to their native places in Gonda, Basti and Bahraich was stopped by police near Maharajpur check-post at Kanpur-Allahabad National Highway on Friday. They claimed that they were coming from Telangana and Pune and had been walking for the last 15 days to reach home.
SP (Kanpur city) Raj Kumar Agarwal claimed that the migrants were stopped following strict instructions not to allow even a single person's entry into the district as borders were sealed. “Therefore, they have been asked to be quarantined and we are making all arrangements for their food and stay,” said the official. He added that the migrants would have to go through thermal screening and other medical tests while being quarantined.
Another group of 49 migrant workers, all residents of Maharajganj district, travelled around 1,700 km hiding under a tarpaulin in a truck from Pune to their native place Kolhui, flouting the lockdown.
According to Maharajganj police chief Rohit Singh Sajwan, during routine checking on the highway on Friday morning, cops saw a moving truck with a Maharashtra number plate covered with tarpaulin. The truck had a slip pasted on the windscreen wherein it was written ‘Essential Services’.
Suspecting foul play, the cops stopped the truck at the barrier. On checking, they were shocked to see 49 migrants herded under the tarpaulin, Sajwan said. The police seized the truck and arrested the driver while the migrants were quarantined in the nearby Bhagirathpur Inter College.
An FIR was lodged against the owner of the truck and Maharashtra Police was informed about the incident. According to the SP, a probe was ordered as to how the truck could move from Pune to Maharajganj during the lockdown.
The migrants were taken to the quarantine facility where they were served food and given medicines, said the sources.
Notably, the truck carrying migrants had left Pune for Maharajganj on April 14 night crossing Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and several districts of UP before reaching Maharajganj on Friday morning.
As per the migrants, they somehow survived on the meagre savings till April 14 but with the announcement of lockdown till May 3, they decided to leave for home.
They also claimed that the owner of the factory in which they were working provided the truck to ferry them to their villages.