Lack of jobs compels many to leave their homes and families in search of livelihood, a quest for a better life that brings with it great struggle in its train.
Migrant workers returning home to vote in the parliamentary election in West Bengal recount stories of their struggles and express their hopes and expectations on a railroad journey.
It will be "didi" in Delhi this time, said a group of men travelling in the Krishnanagar-Lalgola local train to Murshidabad, drawing sharp retort from a few others seated next, who feel apart from retaining power at the Centre, "Modi's party" will sweep in West Bengal.
As the three constituencies in Murshidabad go to polls over the next few days, trains to the district are packed to the full with migrant labourers returning home to cast their votes.
Murshidabad district, along with Malda, send lakhs of labourers from the state to across the country, especially to southern states.
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Rejaul from the Raninagar area of Murshidabad is one of them who works in Kerala's Malappuram district as a sanitation worker. He is returning home after eight months just to cast his vote.
"We have been traditional Congress supporters. But this time I don't know who the candidates are as I was away from home for long. Let's see, he said.
Rejaul was travelling along with 10-12 other men who work along with him in Malappuram. Rafikul, one of those travelling with him, said, "I will be glad if 'didi' becomes prime minister. No one cares about Bengalis as much as she does. She has created an identity in other places for us."
Listening to the conversation half awake, a man in his 40s, travelling in the same direction, said, "They are kids. They know nothing. They haven't seen the way BJP has developed the rest of the country. I live in (BJP-ruled) Haryana's Sonepat, they would understand once they see BJP's development works."
"If Mamata Banerjee has worked so much then why do we have to live away from home to earn our living. None of the Congress, the CPI(M) and the TMC has done anything for us," he added.
Echoing him, Ananda, who is visiting home after over a year, said, Modi is a god. His party should be voted to power in Bengal for a real change in the state.
Murshidabad is considered to be one of the few strongholds of the Congress in the state. The Congress, led by its firebrand leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, here mainly fights it out with the CPI(M)-led Left Front but things have changed in the last few years with switchover of several key leaders to the Trinamool Congress, led by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, popularly called 'didi'.
The Trinamool Congress has fielded former aides of Adhir Chowdhury in two of the three seats in the district and Banerjee has given charge of the party's electioneering to Suvendu Adhikari, a heavyweight state minister and the party's frontman during the Nandigram agitation.
While, the CPM-led Left Front has not fielded any candidate against Adhir Chowdhury in Baharampur, it is hoping to retain Murshidabad, one of the two seats it won last time, and wrest the Jangipur seat from Abhijit Mukherjee, son of former President Pranab Mukherjee.
The BJP of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has also made inroads here but is not being considered a significant player in this Muslim-dominated district.
Salikkula, a construction worker, who was travelling along with his family, said, No one may talk about CPM here, but it was them who cared about us.
I am working in Kolkata for the last 15 years. They gave us insurance cards, helped us form the union and we could go to them with even minor issues, he added.
As the war of words on a hot summer morning upped the election fever, an unusual comment from other side of the crowd interrupted: "What will you get by voting?"
Sidling a minute of silence, the man who was part of a group of officials heading for poll training in Nadia district, said, There is no security. Officials are disappearing from their offices. An official was killed during last year's panchayat polls, why will you go out and vote?
Echoing him, another one of them said, We are schoolteachers, have families, whenever we get poll duty, our families are terrified because of the violence.
Today, after our training we will tell the officers there that if you don't provide us central forces, we will not be doing duty no matter what, he said, before he and his colleagues got down at Ranaghat.
While, Jangipur and Murshidabad Lok Sabha seats vote on Tuesday, polling in Baharampur will be held on April 29.
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content
