Lakhs of daily wage earners, poor and labourers have bee nhit hard by the 21-day lockdown from March 24 midnight till April 14 to tackle the spread of coronavirus COVID-19. With their source of income drying, the migrant labourers have been started to move back to their native places,sometimes hundreds of kilometres away from their place of work, negating the entire purpose behind the lockdown announced on March 24, 2020, by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

Over the last two-three days, thousands of poor and migrant labourers, as well as semi-skilled workers, were seen crossing the Delhi border on National Highway 24 along with their families on foot in order to get back to their native place mostly in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Similar scenes have been witnessed in places like Mumbai, Hyderabad and other big cities where thepoor are moving back to their native place, increasing the chances of community spread of the deadly coronavirus as such large groups had no concept of social distancing.

Migrants gather in large number near Delhi-UP border NH24 amid lockdown in the country

In a tragic incident, five persons were killed when their van was hit by a lorry on the Outer Ring Road near the Shamshabad highway inHyderabad. The van was carrying a group of 30 labourers and their family members from Suryapet in Telangana to Raichur in Karnataka. The group was returning to its native place due to the lockdown.

Another accident on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Highway claimed thelives of four people while three were seriously injured when they were hit by atempo. This group, too, was returning to its native place from Maharashtrathrough Gujarat. But they were not allowed to enter Gujarat and so werereturning to Maharashtra.While the state governments have imposed Section 144to avoid gathering of more than four people, the migrant workers have been taking lifts in trucks and other available vehicle or were simply walking backto their villages.

Uttar Pradesh roadways buses were seen plying for Lucknow carrying a large number of people from Lalkuan, Ghaziabad on Saturday. The bus conductors said that even after instructing people to maintain distance while travelling, no one was not ready to listen as all of them are is in a hurry to leave for their native place.