Girl brings injured father on bicycle from Delhi to Bihar

DARBHANGA: For a 15-year-old girl, cycling for a week to cover nearly 1,200km from Delhi to Darbhanga with her injured father riding pillion, it was a feat no less than completing the grueling Tour de France - the world's longest bicycle race.
Even among the scores of stories of grit and courage pouring in from across the country of desperate migrant workers making perilous journeys, Jyoti Kumari's courageous decision stands out.Not just for the sheer physical endurance the journey demanded, but also negotiating roads and highways that are unsafe for women even within city limits.
However, the Class VII student says she was more worried about being hit by a vehicle from behind. "I did not feel very scared even while cycling at night as we used to see hundreds of migrants walking on the highways. Our only concern was road accidents, which fortunately we did not face," says Jyoti.
The father and daughter duo started their journey from Delhi on May 10 after buying a bicycle for Rs500 and reached their village on the evening of May 16 (last Saturday).
"My father used to drive an e-rickshaw in Delhi. But he became unemployed because he had to surrender the rickshaw to its owner after the lockdown. And he also suffered a leg injury," Jyoti tells TOI over phone from the quarantine centre at her village in Darbhanga.
She adds: "We did not have much money and the landlord pressured my father either to pay or vacate the room. No one was there to help us so we decided to return to our village. We talked to a truck driver, who demanded Rs6000 for bringing us from Delhi to Darbhanga, but we could not afford to pay the money. Finally, I asked my father to pillion ride on the bicycle bought with Rs 500 and we started for Darbhanga."
Recalling the perilous journey, Jyoti says, "We had only Rs600 with us when we left Delhi. I used to cycle day and night taking breaks of 2-3 hours at petrol pumps during the night hours. We mostly ate food at relief camps and those offered by some good Samaritans on the way." The villagers were surprised when they saw them enter the village on a cycle and directed them not to go their house and instead stay at the village library. Both were given food by the villagers and were finally screened and quarantined at Government Middle School, Sirhulli on Sunday.
However, Jyoti was told to stay in home quarantine as she was the lone female inmate at the quarantine centre. Mukesh Paswan, brother-in-law of Jyoti, says, "We were startled when we heard that Jyoti cycled all the way back from Delhi with her father as pillion."