High travelling cost, pay loss force migrant workers to skip voting

Tirupur: Many of the workers migrated from other states to Coimbatore and Tirupur districts have decided to forgo their right to vote in the Lok Sabha elections. Industry sources said migrant workers were not interested to travel home due to high transportation cost and loss of pay.
More than 1.5 lakh people from various states including Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar, Assam, Uttar Pradesh and northeastern states are working in different industries in Coimbatore and Tirupur districts. They mostly go home for a month once or twice in a year during festivals like Dussehra and Diwali.

“I have been working in powerloom units in Tirupur for six years. I am not casting my vote this election as I was not given a long leave to go home. Most of my friends from northern states are also not going home to exercise their votes,” Suresh Kumar Bhoi of Odisha told TOI.

“Many of us could not afford the transportation cost, and we also would face loss of pay if we do not work in those days. For instance, it would cost Rs 5,000, including transportation cost, food and other expenses, for a person to travel to Bihar and return to Tirupur,” said Pawan Kumar Singh of Bihar.

N Ramasamy, manager of Odisha migration support centre in Tirupur, said, “Many people from other states would not go to exercise their votes, and it will affect turnout. The industrial units would not allow workers who are in their good books to leave frequently.”

But still some people have started from here to cast their votes in their native places. “Some have gone to vote in Bihar and UP and attend festivals in their villages,” Sanoj Kumar of Begusarai district in Bihar said, adding, “I had transferred my vote to Tirupur constituency and so I will vote here. But I have to take my wife to her native to allow her to cast her vote.”