This story is from May 12, 2020

Homebound migrants slip through bylanes, keep to tracks

Determined to go home, even if it is thousands of km away, and on foot in this summer heat, migrant workers in the sealed containment areas of Pune have started exploiting the gaps in the protective ring to reach Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
Homebound migrants slip through bylanes, keep to tracks
Some youths began their journey home on foot on Monday
PUNE: Determined to go home, even if it is thousands of km away, and on foot in this summer heat, migrant workers in the sealed containment areas of Pune have started exploiting the gaps in the protective ring to reach Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
On Monday, TOI came across four such workers who found their way out of the areas where the police claimed barley 24 hours ago that vigil had been stepped up due to contain the workers watching others from the non-containment areas hitting the road.

The authorities have prevented those in the containment areas from moving out. They cannot get a travel pass which can facilitate their journey by special trains operated for these workers.
Mahesh Shankar (34) started his walk to Satna in MP on Monday. “Kya karein. Ab humara dimag kaam karna band ho gaya hai aur hum aise hi latak gaye hai.” (What to do. My brain has stopped working now and I am stranded),” he said.
Shankar shared a room at Narveer Tanajiwadi in Shivajinagar gaothan. It is one of the 69 containment areas in the city. He had approached the Shivajinagar police for a travel pass, but was told to wait.
“I waited but the authorities said I won’t get a pass. I will walk to Satna. The news on my cellphone told me about people walking to their home towns in Uttar Pradesh or Bihar from Mumbai,” he said.
He used an unmanned narrow lane leading to the railway tracks. “No one was around. I started walking towards Yerawada from Patil Estate slums,” he added.

Ajay Chouhan from Agra was working at a tea shop in Pune. He walked out of his Raviwar Peth home, another Covid-19 hotspot.
“I had applied for a travel pass with the Faraskhana police. They told me on Saturday that I won’t get a pass. I waited for a day but when nothing changed, I decided to start walking to Agra. I left early in the morning and nobody noticed,” Chouhan, who was spotted in Yerawada, told TOI.
Ashwini Kumar started from Mangalwar Peth for his home in Jhansi and Madhav Saha stepped out of Shivajinagar gaothan for Hoshangabad. Both hoped to hitch rides from truckers.
The Shivajinagar and Faraskhana police officials said migrants moving out of the containment zones via small unguarded lanes was possible.
“The entry/exit points of the containment zones are sealed and we are counselling the migrant workers to be patient as the government is trying hard to address their problem. We will now keep better watch over the unguarded lanes,” an officer said.
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