PM should ensure migrants are ferried home for free: CPIM

CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury on Tuesday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi should ensure that all migrants stranded in the cities are ferried back to their homes for free.

Addressing an online press conference, he said all non-income tax payees should be given Rs 7500 per month for the next three months and the needy must be given 10 kgs of food grains per person every month for the next six months.

"Even today we find lakhs of them are on the road trudging along 1,000 kilometers, hungry and starving. And not one government agency to help them," Yechury said.

Referring to the Aurangabad train tragedy that killed 16 migrant workers who were headed home, he said the trains carried the dead bodies of those workers instead of taking them to their homes alive.

"At least now on 49th day, the PM should make arrangements for free transportation to take them home and stop threatening them that if you report to work action will be taken. We must remember, in India, workers are not slaves,” Yechury said.

He said it was unfair to push the responsibility of looking after the migrant workers on the state governments.

Yechury also alleged that the government had achieved very little in the 49 days of the lockdown and claimed that the testing numbers were still low.

"We have completed 49 days of this lockdown. When it was first announced the number of positive COVID-19 cases were 566, today it stands at 70,756, number of deaths was 10 and today its 2295. We could have done a lot better if we had done more testing, if we had provided adequate protection to our doctors,” he added.

"If there is global appreciation it is for Kerala, at least 35 dailies of repute have carried on their front page how Kerala has managed to contain and minimise the loss of life. An example that the country should emulate,” he added.

The leaders of eight political parties – the CPI(M), CPI, CPI(ML), RSP, AIFB, JD, LJD, and VCK – who earlier wrote to the President of India raising opposition to the annulment of labour laws, will hold a protest on May 13, at 12.00 noon at the CPI(M) headquarters here.