Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is miffed at the Centre’s decision to send 41 Shramik Special trains ferrying migrant workers from Maharashtra which being the most affected State in India accounts for about one third of the total corona cases in the country.
With the local infrastructure already bursting at its seams following large-scale devastation left behind by super cyclone Amphan, an alarmed State administration has expressed its displeasure at the Indian Railways indifferent approach towards the plight of the State, Government sources said.
The Government’s displeasure was apparent from the language of State Home Secretary Alapan Bandopadhyay who on Tuesday said that “several lakhs of migrant workers returning from severely infected States will be a big issue and a big problem… it will be a big concern for the public health.”
The State Government has held the Railways and Maharastra Government jointly responsible for pushing back such large number of migrant workers from Maharashtra particularly the Dharavi region of Mumbai which accounts for about 1,500 cases.
Banerjee had earlier asked the Railways not send Bengal bound trains “as the district administrations are involved in relief and rehabilitation works, it will not be possible to receive special trains for the next few days. It is therefore requested that no train should be sent to West Bengal till May 26.”
State Chief Secretary Rajiva Sinha too had written to Chairman of Railway board V K Yadav asking him not to send in the shramik specials as the state had been severely impacted by the super cyclone causing extensive damage to the infrastructure.
Already Bengal has received 6 trains from Maharashtra. “Given the current infrastructural situation the State is not in a position to receive more workers… It will lead to large-scale proliferation once the trains start rolling in,” a senior official said adding “all the good effects of the two months lockdown will simply go down the drain.”
Claiming that the migrant workers accounted for the 80 percent of the total new infections he said that the migrant workers from Maharashtra constituted the 76 new cases recorded in Howrah alone.
Opposition BJP however attacked the Chief Minister for dilly-dallying the process of repatriation of the migrant workers. Senior BJP leader Rahul Sinha on Tuesday targeted the Chief Minister saying “Mamata Banerjee’s lies that she was arranging for the return of the migrant labouers to Bengal have now been exposed.
She claimed that she has asked for many trains but now her Government is objecting to their return… I want to ask the Chief Minister to come clean on her policy on the migrant workers.”
Meanwhile, Bengal recorded 192 new cases in the past 24 hours taking the total number of corona infections to 4008, sources said adding 211 patients had died due to the diseases. This was in addition to the 72 cases of death on account of co-morbidity.
