Migrant workers flock to Uttar Pradesh after Delhi lockdown

Thousands of migrant workers thronged the state capital on Tuesday after the lockdown announcement in Delhi, triggering chaotic scenes at bus stations.

According to reports, these migrant workers had left Delhi on Monday night after the lockdown was announced and were looking for buses to go to their home towns and villages mainly in the eastern Uttar Pradesh districts of Gorakhpur, Deoria, Azamgarh and others.

Sources said that there were fewer buses at the main bus station at Alambagh, as many UP Roadways buses are deployed in the ongoing panchayat polls. This created difficulties for the workers.

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''We have arranged private buses for the workers to take them to their hometowns,'' said a senior UP Roadways official on Tuesday.

UP minister Siddharth Nath Singh accused the Delhi government of leaving the workers on the borders at Noida and Ghaziabad. ''The lockdown in Delhi was announced in haste....the migrant workers had to face many problems....Delhi government buses left them at the borders,'' Singh said.

The minister said that the UP government would make arrangements to take them (workers) home.

The UP government has refused to announce lockdown in the state despite a record surge in the number of Covid positive cases and deaths of many patients owing to shortage of oxygen and non-availability of beds at the hospitals. The state government has, instead, announced a weekend lockdown on Saturday and Sunday.