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The Uttar Pradesh government has provided 1,000 buses, both state-run and private, for transportation of migrant workers and their kin stranded on Delhi-UP border, some of whom had even started to walk home.
Information Advisor to Chief Minister,  Mritunjay, said that the chief minister was quite concerned about the plight of these people since Friday and held a meeting with Transport department officials wherein it was decided that the government would send a fleet of buses to ensure that these people reached their homes.
“We needed almost 1,000 buses as not only people from UP but also from Bihar were stranded on Delhi-UP border. Their evacuation and safe transit were priorities for the government,” he said.
However, politics started over the issue as UP officials claimed that these people were driven out of Delhi and dropped on the UP border.
“This is unfortunate on part of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal to dump these hapless people at this crucial juncture as the entire country is fighting against coronavirus. UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has written to all chief ministers to take care of people from  UP and has said that the UP government is ready to pay for that,” Mritunjay said.
The advisor to the UP chief minister charged that the Delhi government did nothing to provide essentials like food, milk and other necessities during the lockdown and instead triggered rumour that the UP government was making arrangements of buses to ferry them home.
“The Delhi government even transported these migrants from their homes to UP-Delhi border by DTC buses which created a huge problem for UP,” he said.
Mritunjay further said that the migrants had to face severe hardship and some even complained that their electricity and water connections were disconnected and they were virtually forced to starve.
“But the Yogi government took a call and arranged drivers and conductors and sent these buses to the state border to provide relief to these migrants,” he said.
The buses were arranged from Ghaziabad, Noida, Bulandshahar, Hapur and other bordering districts.
“A large number of migrants along with their families were provided food and other essentials at the border along with transportation to their respective villages,” the official said.
Earlier, Additional Chief Secretary (Home) Awanish Awasthi said that as precautionary measure, district officials were asked to immediately deploy two medical teams at major bus stations and one at small bus stations.
“As soon as any bus carrying labourers from Ghaziabad/Noida arrive, immediate medical check-up should be done without fail,” Awasthi said.