According to AFP, dozens of Indian migrant workers were killed on Saturday in road accidents as they tried to return to their home villages during a nationwide coronavirus lockdown.
Scores have died in road and rail accidents in the central and northern India as millions of labourers have been left stranded and unemployed by the months-long lockdown.
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Amid lockdown, mishaps involving labourers who are walking home have been reported from across the country. In Maharashtra’s Aurangabad, 16 migrant workers were killed last week, after a cargo train ran over them while they were sleeping on the tracks.
In the most deadly incident, a truck carrying about 40 labourers struck another vehicle also carrying workers and their families that was parked at a roadside cafe in Uttar Pradesh. The vehicle was carrying lime powder which suffocated many of those who died, all of whom were men.
In another accident in Madhya Pradesh, a truck bringing labourers back from neighbouring Maharashtra state overturned.
The millions of labourers, who live off subsistence wages, have become a major concern for the government as it prepares to ease the lockdown from Monday in a bid to get the economy moving again.
The Opposition termed the incidents as “murders, not accidents” as Modi government was subjected to severe criticism over not taking adequate measures to help the migrant workers and turning a blind eye to their miseries.
