Not Just Train Ticket, Stranded Workers Have To Pay For Medical Certificate, Get Police Nod

Every year millions of people from across the country leave their homes in search of work in big cities to feed their families because they can't find work in their villages. In the big cities, they are mostly employed in the unskilled sector, in jobs ranging from factories to construction.

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With whatever they earn, they have to feed themselves, pay for their rent, and send some money back home to support them. This often means that the millions of migrant workers will have zero savings and not working for a few days could mean only one thing - hunger.

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Since mid-March millions of migrant workers across the country have been going through this, as the COVID-19 had forced the closure of many factories and construction sites even before the nationwide lockdown came into effect.

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Now after nearly one-and-a-half months, they have been given a ray of hope that they can go home, thanks to the special trains being run by the Indian Railway. This was a short lived joy for many after they came to know that they will have to pay for the tickets to travel home.

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Many who could afford to buy tickets bought them, while others said they had to borrow money from friends or relatives to pay the travel fare.

A controversy erupted on Monday after several opposition parties demanded that migrant workers not be charged for the train tickets.

As the Congress offered to pay for the workers, the BJP hit back, saying the railways was already providing subsidised tickets bearing 85 percent of the travel costs.

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On Monday, the government said that it had never talked about charging the workers train fare. "We have given permission to run special trains on states' request. We are dividing the cost in 85-15 per cent (railway: states) as per the norms. We never asked states to charge money from the stranded labourers," Health Ministry Joint Secretary Lav Agarwal said.

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Several states like Maharashtra and Kerala which have a sizable number of migrant worker population had said that the travel should be made free or the Central government should bear the expenses as states are unable to pay for it due to the financial situation arising out of this coronavirus pandemic.

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The Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said the state had no plans of paying for the tickets of migrants. "The guest workers have booked their tickets by themselves for their travel. We thought that the Centre would bear the expense but that is not happening," said Vijayan. When asked if the state has any plans to bear the ticket charges, he said, "No. The state government was not planning for anything like that."

INDIATIMES

In Karnataka's capital Bengaluru, a government official confirmed the workers were paying their own way home on the Shramik Special Trains. "No, the passengers themselves are paying," said the official when asked if the state government was paying for the migrant labourers.

While the debate on who pays what is going on train fares is just one of the struggles the migrant workers have to face.

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Before they can board the train, they have to have a medical certificate stating that they have no symptoms of Acute Respiratory Infection, fever, cough, cold, breathlessness, or others. And depending on the place and the doctor, the migrant workers say they had to pay between Rs 100-500 to get the certificates.

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They also have to produce the same at the local police station along with proof of identity and certain other documents. Only after receiving clearance, they are allowed to travel.

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Another struggle is online registration for those wanting to return. Most state governments had asked the migrants to register themselves at different online portals. However, since most of them are illiterate or not good with the internet, people are charging anything from Rs 10-50 just to fill up the online forms.

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Even after getting all the clearances they still have to pay for their travel to the railway station, which in most cases are hired buses, where one person may have to shell out a few hundred rupees or more to reach the railway stations.