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As the sun rose over the road in the Indore district, Madan Kumar Saroj had to make a difficult decision. Riding a moped on the scorching summer day without some form of heat protection could prove fatal. But running out of cash and with the rapidly depleting rice stock, the family could only take action stops.
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Seeing a patch of shadow underneath a neem tree along the Mumbai-Indore highway, the 28 family members traveling in a group of ramshackle mopeds to the Kaushambi district of Uttar Pradesh decided to make one of the rare stops to take a breath. The afternoon sun.
“Woh number bole aayega, number aayega. Arey kab aayega (They said their number will come, it will come. But when will it come?) Said an annoyed Devaki Saroj, 42, his wife. The family, after registering to return home with a panchayat in the Pune district of Maharashtra, had waited in vain for 10 days. Both patience and food finally ran out. And they resolved to undertake the journey of more than 1,300 km back home on mopeds.
With the third extension of the closure, hoping that work will resume soon, nearly 50,000 migrant workers have been crossing daily from Maharashtra to the Barwani district of Madhya Pradesh, huddled inside trucks, precariously perched on freight trucks, in bicycles or simply on foot, in a desperate attempt to return home.
Some 10 lakh workers have crossed the border since March 22, said Sendhwa Sub Police Division officer Tarunendra Singh Baghel. While most returned to U.P., many were heading to Rajasthan, Jharkhand, and Odisha.
A kulfi vendor in the Pune district, Mr. Saroj earned ₹ 15,000 per month. Just 10 days after the annual trip, when summer was just beginning, its business prospects were crushed by the closure. And the rest of the days he spent spending the few savings to buy grains. “We had to work as workers in the fields to make ends meet,” he said.
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Once back home, they plan to wait for the monsoon, when agricultural labor will be required.
Stuck inside a truck with Thane’s registration code “MH-04”, Siaram Jaiswal is holding on to a rope at the rear to prevent it from falling over every time the vehicle is navigating a curve or hit or brake. “Every year, I used to send money to my family. Now I had to ask him, ”said Mr. Jaiswal, who worked as a security guard in the city. The truck heads for the Basti district in U, P, and each of the 30 passengers has had to shell out ₹ 4,000 each to reserve a spot, space to support the entire 1,600 km journey.
“My town does not have factories; that’s why we moved to Mumbai, “said Dharam Singh, a 23-year-old fruit vendor, waiting his turn to receive a slice of Khichdi at the border checkpoint, organized by a local temple. “During the period of confinement, we feed on this every day and we get bored. Today, this is our first meal after two days. Doesn’t it look tasty? Kya Bolte? (What do you say?), ”He nudged the worker standing in line in front of him, with bright eyes, who nodded.
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Sonu Rawat, a Saharia Adivasi, pushes a wheelbarrow loaded with utensils, clothing, and toys stacked inside, and three young children throw themselves onto the pile. A tattered piece of discarded sari, tied to four bamboo sticks attached to the cart, barely protects them from the sun.
“Only God is giving us strength,” said Mr. Rawat. The group of 32, who works in a brick kiln on Dhar Road in Indore, is heading to the Lalitpur district of Uttar Pradesh. They said they expected to get home in about 10 days.
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“The contractor, who loaned us ₹ 1 lakh for my daughter’s wedding, took us to the oven so that we could work to pay the amount. We have a job left worth another ₹ 24,000. We will be back after the monsoon, ”he said.
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