Nearly 10 months after 16 migrant labourers were crushed to death by a goods train in Maharashtra’s Aurangabad district while they were returning to Madhya Pradesh during the coronavirus-triggered lockdown, their families here are still waiting to get their death certificates. The family members say that since they have not received the death certificates so far, they are unable to carry out important tasks related to banks and also cannot avail the benefits of government-run schemes.
The 16 migrant workers- 11 from Shahdol district and five from neighbouring Umaria district of Madhya Pradesh- were walking to Bhusawal from Jalna on way to their home state. The slept on rail tracks near Karmad, around 30 km from Aurangabad, due to exhaustion, when they were run over by the train early morning on May 8 last year. The district administration of Shahdol said it has recently sent a letter to the authorities in Maharashtra’s Aurangabad, requesting them to give the death certificates of the deceased to their families, an official said.
The family members of the deceased here said that they had applied for the death certificate before the then Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) of Jaisingh Nagar. “However, the official said that the death certificate will be issued by the authorities where the mishap occurred,” said Sunita Singh, wife of one of the deceased Rajbahor.
She said that in the absence of her husband’s death certificate, she is unable to get the widow pension of the state government. Chandrawati, wife of another deceased Deepak Singh, said the death certificate is required to avail the benefits of all the government-run schemes.
Parvati Singh, wife of another deceased Brajesh, said she was not able to get the works related to banks done in absence of a certificate. Gajraj Singh, who lost his two sons in the incident, said the bank officials have been asking him to bring death certificates to operate the accounts of the deceased.
However, Jaisingh Nagar’s SDM Dileep Pandey said the death certificates will be issued by the authorities under whose jurisdiction the accident took place. “We recently wrote two letters to the Aurangabad administration in this regard,” he said.
According to him, the district collector of Shahdol also recently talked to his Aurangabad counterpart in this regard.