Unpaid for a month, over 2,000 migrants attack cops in Hyderabad

Mahesh Buddi | TNN | Apr 30, 2020, 06:50 IST

PTI photo

HYDERABAD: Barely hours before the Centre eased lockdown rules on Wednesday to let migrant workers return home, more than 2,000 angry labourers attacked private security and police at the Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad (IIT-H) campus. They had been hired to work on a construction site inside the campus. The labourers were upset over being asked to start when they had not been paid for the past month. They also wanted to go back to their home states.
An assistant police sub inspector and a private security guard received minor injuries when the workers started pelting stones. The mob also damaged a police vehicle before senior police officials rushed to the spot and pacified the workers. “Both the injured men are out of danger,” a senior police official said.
District police officials said contract for the new buildings at IIT-Hyderabad in Kandi has been given to L&T and Shapoorji Pallonji. “Put together, 2,354 migrant workers have been working at the site. Work was suspended in the lockdown and the labourers have been provided shelter at a camp of the construction firms,” Sangareddy DIG S Chandrasekhar Reddy said.
On Wednesday, supervisors of the two construction firms asked the labourers to return to work after getting permission to start work. The workers, who had not been paid for March, got upset and chased away the supervisors. “When the workers saw police approaching, they started pelting stones,” Sangareddy DSP Sridhar Reddy said.
The workers want to return home. “We do not want to stay here anymore,” said a worker from Bihar. “The company representatives agreed to clear the dues by Thursday. We have explained to them that returning home is not possible right away,” the DIG said.