Despite work starting in infrastructure projects including road and bridge construction in the State, migrant workers say they just want to go home.
Sources in the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) said that the men only say that they are afraid that COVID-19 will take a couple of more years to subside, and the safest thing is to be at home.
Amrith Thirki, a labourer from Odisha said that he and some 50 men from his village had been asked to come home by parents. “The number of cases here are increasing, which is scary. We will go home and stay till the virus subsides and then return to do work. Our lives seem more important than money now,” he said.
“Work has started in several of our sites. But labour availability has become a major issue. Last night, around 25 workers from Odisha left a site near Chennai. They feared that we will not be able to pay them. But we have paid ₹120 per day as allowance for 50 days, provided them with food, and promised to pay them wages even for the days they were without work,” said a contractor with the NHAI.
A contractor with the State Highways Department said that men from Bihar at one of his sites had been telling him they wanted to go back home. “We have told them to work till passes are issued and trains are available. We ensured food and now, have also paid wages,” he said.
