PIL in SC seeks food, shelter for migrant workers, their families

A PIL was filed in the Supreme Court on Friday seeking food, water, shelter, medical aid and 'urgent indulgence to the plight of migrant workers and their families including women, kids, elders and Divyangs, who are walking on foot to their villages, amid COVID-19 crisis."

The petition was filed by the apex court lawyer Alakh Alok Srivastava. It sought urgent order or direction from the Supreme Court to the respondent, Union of India, to immediately redress the "heart wrenching and inhuman plight" of thousands of migrant workers, walking on foot for hundreds of kilometres.

It is expected that Srivastava's Public Interest Litigation (PIL) would come up for hearing before the Supreme Court next week and maybe on Monday (March 30).

 

They are travelling from big cities of India to their respective native villages without food, water, transport, medicine or shelter, amid present coronavirus crisis, the petition stated.

Srivastava has sought the direction from the apex court to the Union of India to direct the local administration/police authorities across India to immediately identify such moving/stranded migrant workers and to immediately shift them to the nearest government shelter homes/accommodations with proper food, and other facilities, the petition stated.

Srivastava, in his petition, said that migrant workers/labourers need water, medicines and under medical supervision, in a dignified manner, till the present lockdown continues.

The lawyer further said the biggest sufferers of this crisis are the poor, unregistered migrant workers, working in various big cities of India as cycle-rickshaw pullers, rag pickers, construction workers, factory workers, housemaids, servants, unskilled and semi-skilled workers, etc.

As trains and buses are suspended, several of such migrant workers are walking for kilometres to reach their villages. Many are unable to make it across state borders and thus are left stranded on roads, without food, water or shelter. There is a large-scale human distress, the petitioner stated.

Srivastava said in his petition that many such poor migrant labourers and their families, including women, elders, small children and differently-abled people are either walking on foot or left stranded at various parts of the country in an utmost inhuman condition. Many of them are deprived of basic shelter, food or even drinking water, he stated.

Being jobless and stranded, these migrants workers are not only struggling to make ends meet but are now also fighting stigma as 'virus' carriers. Hence, they are not likely to be accepted by their respective villages, once they reach there, the petition stated.