Grateful for new clothes, migrants help clean shelter

At a school-turned-shelter home for migrant workers in Delhi’s Rohini Sector 3, a group of teachers and school employees collected money to buy new clothes for the

At a school-turned-shelter home for migrant workers in Delhi’s Rohini Sector 3, a group of teachers and school employees collected money to buy new clothes for the workers staying on the school premises during the lockdown. Grateful to the school authorities, the migrant workers have started cleaning the school premises.

HT Image

Tens of thousands of migrant workers who were leaving the national Capital last month in the first week of the nationwide lockdown were stopped at the city borders and taken to different shelter homes across the city. Several government schools in the city have also been turned into temporary shelter homes to house the migrant workers and their families. They are being fed and looked after by the government and the police. At many shelter homes across the city, the government is organising yoga classes for adults and activities for their children to help cope with the lockdown.

When 28-year-old Arvind Kumar, a migrant labourer from Bihar, was brought to a shelter home set up at a Delhi government school in Rohini Sector 3 last month, he had no money, food or clothes. For the next few weeks, he wore the same pair of jeans and a shirt. But as the days turned hotter, and the mercury reached close to the 40 degree Celsius mark, it became difficult for him to survive without another set of clothing. There were several people at the shelter home facing the same problem as Kumar.

To bring relief to Kumar and other inmates at the shelter home, the school staff pooled in money and bought new clothes for all the 141 migrant labourers residing there. “It’s such a relief for us all. I could not have imagined buying clothes in this situation. All my stuff is locked in a factory I used to work at in Rohini. Now it’s become easier to survive the summer,” he said.

School principal Arun Bhatia said that many of those who were shifted to his school earlier this month had tried to run away from other shelter homes. “We wanted to make them feel at home here. Although the government is providing food, medication and even organising yoga classes for them, we found that a majority of them were finding it difficult to survive since they did not have clothes. The school staff decided to collect money and get clothes for them,” he said.

To show their appreciation, the migrant workers at the shelter have started helping out around the premises.

OP Meena, a teacher at the school sai, that the inmates now help them clean the garden area, water trees and plants and also help distribute of food and tea every day. “They trim the grass in the garden and also water plants. Some of them helping in the door-to-door distribution of food and tea while maintaining the rules of social distancing. Those who used to work at construction sites also helped us shift unnecessary furniture from rooms and make space to store food,” he said.

Getting new clothes was not an easy task for the school staff amid the lockdown. “We spoke to a businessman in Patel Nagar who deals in readymade garments. They had a stock of kurta pyjamas in their godown and they were ready to sell them to us. Then we discussed the matter with the police and requested them for a pass to go and collect the stock. The inmates were really happy when we distributed the new pair of clothes among them,” Bhatia said.

A 20-year-old migrant worker from Bihar, who worked as a waiter until the lockdown, said, “I got a new pair of clothes for the first time in years. I’m used to wearing hand-me-down shirts and pants belonging to my hotel owner’s son.”