Mumbai: Bandra incident sets off political blame game

Thousands of labourers dispersed by Mumbai Police near Jama Masjid Bandra who were gathered around a truck which was there to distribute food items.
(Express photo)

The migrant workers’ protest at Bandra set off a political slugfest in Maharashtra with the Shiv Sena blaming the Centre for failing to decide how migrant labourers could be safely sent back to their hometowns and the state BJP accusing the MVA government of “abdicating” its responsibility.

“The current situation at Bandra Station, now dispersed, or even the rioting in Surat is a result of the Union government not being able to take a call on arranging a way back home for migrant labourers. They don’t want food or shelter, they want to go back home,” state Environment Minister Aaditya Thackeray tweeted. The textile workers from Surat, largely from Orissa, had last week created ruckus and set handcarts on fire in Laskana area of the district demanding for arrangements to return home.

The Worli MLA claimed the state government had time and again been raising the need for a roadmap for transporting migrant workers back to their respective states. “Right from the day when trains were first shut down, Maharashtra has been requesting for another 24-hour run so that migrant workers can go back to their home state. Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray ji had even raised this issue in the PM-CM video-conference, requesting a roadmap for transporting migrant workers. A mutual roadmap set by the Centre will largely help transport them from one state to another safely and efficiently,” Aaditya tweeted.

The BJP, meanwhile, claimed the incident highlighted the failure of the state government in taking care of the migrant labourers. “It is the state government’s responsibility to make arrangements for food and shelter for the migrant workers. We’ve pointed out that such arrangements are not in place, but the ruling combine has paid no heed,” BJP MLA Devendra Fadnavis said.

Former Mumbai Congress president Sanjay Nirupam said, “They (workers) were not getting food to eat, while their way back home was blocked. For how long could they have been suppressed? Much of the government’s relief plan has remained on paper.”

Till Tuesday, the state has 3.32 lakh workers from 25 states, including Maharashtra and neighbouring Nepal, stuck in 2,691 camps that have been set up across the state. Of them, a total of 1,51,887 or 46 per cent, are from outside Maharashtra. In the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) alone, there were as many as 1,09,307 workers stranded across 933 locations, with the island city alone reporting 44,702 workers at 351 locations and the suburbs accounting for another 20,205. As per the latest records, the highest number of stranded workers were from Bihar at 30,320, followed by West Bengal (23,679) and Uttar Pradesh (23,136), Madhya Pradesh (16,903), Jharkhand (16,182) and Chattisgarh (8,817).

Civil society members and NGOs, meanwhile, claimed there was a sense of desperation among migrant labourers. “If this did not occur earlier during the lockdown, it is entirely due to the efforts of the civil society groups that have stepped in and provided food and groceries for migrant workers stranded here. Not only do large numbers of migrant workers not have ration cards, but many had also run out of money to afford the subsidised grain,” said Shweta Damle of Habitat and Livelihood Welfare Association.

— With inputs from KAVITHA IYER

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