Kshitiz Kant; Lucknow
India's
unemployment was already soaring, but this lockdown has brought many labourers
on the verge of starvation.
83%
of India's population dwells in the rural areas. Labourers are now jobless who
had returned to their native land from the big cities, or still staying in
quarantine camps of the states, after the announcement of shutdown this week.
Prime
Minister, Narendra Modi, in his speech to the nation on March 19 last month had
first called upon to the people to stay in their homes under Janta Curfew held
on March 22 for a day.
He
had appealed to the people to go on the balconies or windows of their homes to ring the bells,
make clapping and other ways to pay gratitude of performing hard duties to
serve sufferers of pandemic COVID-19 for 5 minutes on being ended of this
curfew.
It
is now clear with the fatalities going on in the world that many countries are
in the trap of this unidentified pandemic.
The
day by day deaths toll are constantly rising.
Seeing
the emergency of the people's
health PM on March 24 declared country
to be fully lockdown mid-night of March 24/25.
The
country is observing 21 days of lockdown since then. However the announcement
by PM gave people 4 hours to fix themselves to face this health emergency.
Many
people are peasants who were there to earn daily wages so that they could have
helped their families whether they were in their native homes or they were with
them on the working sites.
After
the shutdown of working places they had come under unemployment and began to
return to their homes, but the homes were miles away from the employers where
they were on work.
Now
the employers began to obviate from these daily workers so not to make a mutual
concession.
Sudden
surge of people on railway stations and on bus stations overcrowded these
places, but there every buses were parked and the trains were in yards of
station after observing lockdown.
Two
types of toughness emerged -- first that none were following the social
distancing guidelines to safe themselves from the pandemic infections; second
they were now jobless to how they would have managed their daily meal if they
had stayed, so their escape from there were the need of the hours.
They
had mere option was that to leave the
cities, so they started their journeys onfoot to go back home.
A
few of them were marching with their babies sitting on lap and a few with the
bale of their valuables on heads were going on across the National Highway.
This
exodus' first journey was seen from Delhi upto Lucknow by on foot, then by
buses upto their native home districts.
The
government of UP then had come in action and the atrocities police over these under
media pressure was a little got soft; UPSRTC department began to help these
needy and the buses were carrying these people to the native districts.
