Law school gives wing to migrants' prayers

saviours

Chattisgarh migrants proceed to check-in at BIAL, for a flight to their home state organised by NLSIU alumnion June 4, 2020.

For hundreds of stranded migrants across the country struggling to find a way back to far-flung villages, an unlikely saviour has appeared in the form of the city’s National Law School of India University (NLSIU).

Alumni of the university across the country have banded together to set up what they call, mission “Aahan Vahaan” (Vehicle of the New Light), an ambitious effort to transport nearly 18,000 migrants from Covid-19-affected metropolises in the country, primarily Bengaluru and Mumbai to their home states.

Since the first mission began on May 28 with a flight from Mumbai repatriating 174 daily-wage migrants to Jharkhand, three subsequent relief flights have taken place, explained C K Nandakumar, a city-based advocate and NLSIU alumni.

Among these was the first from Bengaluru - an 8 am early bird special on June 4 from Kempegowda International Airport (KIA), which flew 185 migrants (including six infants and 23 children) to Raipur, Chhattisgarh. “The flight was organised because there is no direct train from Bengaluru to Raipur,” Nandakumar said.

With thousands of migrants waiting to go home, the greatest challenge was identifying true cases of need.

NLSIU alumnus Talha Salaria helped get the Bengaluru flight off the ground and is helping to organise a second flight in the coming week.

Among the standout cases was a young father whose wife had died in April. Unable to care for his young children, a 10-year-old girl and an 8-year-old-boy, the worker had been trying to return to his family Chhattisgarh for the last two months, Talha explained.

“His wife developed a haemoglobin deficiency shortly after the lockdown was imposed on March 25. Hospitals did not provide medical aid and she died. He was teary-eyed shortly before he flew out with his children,” she said.

So far, the four flights have evacuated about 750 migrants. The NLSIU group intends to carry out a further seven flights within the next two weeks.

Nandakumar described their efforts as supplementing the government’s efforts. “The government is running Shramik trains, it also helped us with data. We see our efforts as augmenting the government’s efforts,” he said.

Although the first flight was funded by NLSIU alumni, the second was funded by the Godrej family and the third by parents of a school in Mumbai. The Bengaluru flight was wholly funded by Ajay Bahl, a New Delhi-based lawyer. Each flight costs approximately Rs 12 to 15 lakh to charter.