With the Railways sending 41 trains packed with migrant workers to Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has questioned the Centre’s “true intentions” behind pushing back lakhs of people “many of whom are infected with the coronavirus ... particularly in the aftermath of super cyclone Amphan,” and said she would request Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s intervention into the matter.
A visibly miffed Chief Minister on Wednesday said that the “Centre is pushing Bengal into a catastrophic situation by pushing back lakhs of migrant workers many of who are corona infected” particularly at a time when the State’s infrastructure is bursting at its seams in the wake of Amphan.
“Already a few lakh migrant workers have come back to Bengal. And now about 28 trains are ferrying back thousands of workers more … many of them are corona infected,” the Chief Minister said blaming the Railways for taking a one-sided decision.
“We were kept in the dark before planning the workers’ return,” she said adding “in a bid to empty Mumbai you are creating problem in Bengal. Corona cases are rising proportionately to the rolling in of trains from infected states.”
An angry Chief Minister said “who will take responsibility if the number of corona cases shoots up in the wake of mass repatriation of the migrant workers. Already we have seen that many such people are infected… Is this a time to do politics by public health at risk.”
Claiming that there was a “politics behind this whole affair so that the Bengal Government can be maligned,” the Chief Minister said that she had even asked Home Minister Amit Shah to dismiss our Government in Bengal and take things into his hands if he really thought that her Government was unable to control the situation.
“When I asked him to take things into his own hands by toppling our Government he replied in the negative saying it would be unfair to bring down an elected Government,” she said adding “the Railways could have planned the things out taking our Government into confidence.They could have followed the lockdown norms and jointly we could have taken 15 days’ time to arrange for adequate number of quarantine centres” she said.
In the wake of mass return of the migrant workers the Bengal Government has decided to keep them in government quarantine centres. “Workers returning from five most corona affected states (Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan and Delhi) would be kept in compulsory quarantine at government facilities,” a senior State bureaucrat said adding the schools and colleges would be used for quarantining the migrant workers.”
Meanwhile, the State Government allowed partial resumption of transport activities green-signaling auto rickshaws to ply on Kolkata streets with two passengers. However schools and colleges will remain shut till at least June 30 on account of large-scale damage caused to the government school buildings and partially because of the fact that many such educational institutions would now function as quarantine centres, State Education Minister Partho Chatterjee said.
