According to some migrant workers who came out today, it’s because they wanted to show what they were feeling. Desperate, they apparently organised themselves to come out. They repeat ‘we want to go home, even if it’s on foot.’ They say the food being supplied isn’t enough.

They add they are getting dry rations and meals but not enough. And while working they had shifts so there was place to sleep as half of them would be at work. Now everyone is home so no space to sleep in their shanties. Even using the pay and use toilet costs money, they say.

But what’s also very clear is that these migrant labourers don’t want to live in camps. They know staying in a camp means they are stuck. And mentally, they had planned to leave on the 14th. Currently Maharashtra Government has 4573 labour camps sheltering 560450 & feeding 736939

Also when we asked them why they weren’t carrying basic belongings & why they came to Bandra West, instead Bandra Terminus, they say they had barely stepped out of the adjacent slum when police stopped them. So police was quick. Also this was hardly 10% of the slum population.

The migrant workers issue is an inter and intra state problem. It requires a national consensus and national effort. It requires a policy level intervention on a war footing. Cities like Mumbai have the heaviest burden to bear with a huge migrant population.