Many Bihar migrants still waiting for their turn to go back home

Nagpur: Everyday thousands of migrant labourers heading back to their respective home states from various parts of the country but around 70-80 Bihari migrants residing at Nizamuddin Colony under the jurisdiction of Yashodhara Nagar police station are still waiting for their turn.
The migrant workers, who work as hand craft on contract basis in the city, have been running from pillar to post to get themselves registered for their travel back to their home state.
“I have been living in Nagpur for the last five to seven years, but I regularly used to visit my home district Madhubani in Bihar every few months.
“We rent room in Nizamuddin Colony and work hand craft for garments. Since the lockdown, we spent whatever we had and were facing severe crisis,” said Zakir Mohammad after making a visit to the Yashodhara Nagar police station to get permission to return to his state along with 80 other labourers.
The days in the city are getting worse for the migrants as they don’t have money and are dependent on food from NGOs. “We stand in queues to get food everyday. Sometimes we get, sometimes we don’t. We are living like animals here and need to go home,” Zakir said.
The labourers said they were told to fill up an online form to get accommodation to return home. “We approached a computer operator and passed on all information to him to fill up the forms but did not receive any call from the administration. We waited for several days but nothing happened, then, we were told that we could approach police stations and get ourselves registered for travel,” said another labourer.
They claimed that they visited the police station several times. “Now the cops are saying that they have organized a bus for us after two days. We are hoping that they take us back home,” another labourer said.
Haidar Ali, a social worker from the area, claimed that some of the labourers were also tenants at his home. “They are indeed facing several problems and need to go back home. A few days back, they were asked to go to the Ajni railway station to catch a train to their home state. But when they walked all the way to the station, they were asked to return,” he said.
Sources said that there were around 800 to 900 labourers from different states in the nearby places of Yashodhara Nagar and all of them are trying separately to get back home.
Senior PI of Yashodhara Nagar police station Deepak Sakhre said that everyday several migrants approached the police station and provided all the necessary information.
“We transfer the information to our senior officials who later make a group of migrants. Following which the migrants are contacted and sent to their hometowns via buses and trains. Till now, around 250 migrants who registered at my police station have been sent back home,” PI Sakhre said.
Recently, the police department had claimed that around 5,000 migrant labourers had been sent to their states via buses.