Janhapank: Around six months ago, they hired private buses to return to their home Odisha while escaping the woes of the COVID-19 lockdown and unemployment prospects. But today the migrant workers of Boudh district are waiting for the buses to take them back to their jobs which they had left as the industries have reopened in those states. Little did they know that they will be greeted with no-vacancy signs here.
The Odisha migrant workers made big splash in the news as they, in thousands, returned to the state on foot. Industries were shutting, they were running out of their savings but their expenses remained as they were and thus began the journey towards home.
But just after six months of their return journey, they are again keen to go back to their previous job places as there are not so bright employment opportunities in Odisha. They are again struggling for sustenance.
The Unlock-4.0 has removed all restrictions including inter-state movement of people. For this, the agents have informally started urging returnee migrant workers in Boudh district to prepare for going back to Surat and other industries in Tamil Nadu.
As the textile units in Surat in Gujarat have reopened now, the owners of the factories need manpower. The owners are sending their agents to Odisha to ferry the returnee migrant workers back by luring them with extra wages.
Several returnee migrant workers in Janhapank area of Boudh district were seen waiting for a bus on NH-57 on the wee hours of Monday. When our correspondent asked some of them (who did not wish to be named) on why they are again keen to go back to their former job places, they answered that they were being encouraged to return to Gujarat (Surat) and Tamil Nadu as early as possible, over phone calls and personal meetings with agents who claimed to be working on behalf of textile mill or other industry owners in Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. We are being urged to reach there and bargain with mill owners for better working conditions and other facilities, they said.
Now, the question remains— what about the tall promises that the state government had made regarding providing employment to these returnee migrants.
Another thing which adds to the woes of these migrant workers is that they are doing manual labour in and outside the state without any official registration. Following this, there exploitation is happening be in terms of wages or job conditions.
Notably, under the Inter-State Migrant workmen Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1979 the migrant workers have to be provided with the basic benefits by their employer outside the state. According to this law, inter-state migrant workers are to be registered through licensed labour contractors.
As the middlemen are taking the migrants workers by avoiding the process, they have to compromise while settling wages and other benefits with the employers.
Some NGOs and intellectuals of the district urged the Odisha government to ensure employment to these workers or to register both the returnees and well as workers who have stayed back in other states. They urged the state government to ask the other state governments for the migrants’ registration at their workplace under the Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, so that they do not suffer in future.
PNN