Over 50 daily wagers stranded without ration, wages in Jor Bagh

Over 50 daily wagers, including some women and children stranded at a Delhi government school under-construction site at south Delhi’s Jor Bagh, have been struggling

Over 50 daily wagers, including some women and children stranded at a Delhi government school under-construction site at south Delhi’s Jor Bagh, have been struggling to get two square meals a day.

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The workers said that they have not been paid ever since all work was halted post-lockdown and have nearly exhausted their savings. They have been approaching the local authorities but to no avail.

The group includes 37 men, eight women and six children. They have been trying to reach out to agencies to help them with dry ration so that they can cook their own meals, as they are not able to get food on a daily basis from the nearest food distribution centre and have to sleep hungry at times.

Saddam Hussein, 22, who came to Delhi just a year ago and has been working on the site, said that the contractor has not even asked them about their well-being, let alone provide help. “We haven’t got our wages for last month. We tried reaching out to the contractor. He did assure us of help, but nothing happened. All of us have almost run out of money. Initially, we could manage, but now there are days when we have to do with very little food or just go hungry,” Hussein, who belongs to West Bengal, said.

He added that the queue at the nearest food distribution centre is long and the portions they get are little. There are days the centre runs out of food while people are still in the queue.

His wife Raina (who goes by her first name) said that she has two children aged 5 and 3, but she hasn’t been able to get milk for them for days. “It is like we are being punished for being labourers,” she said.

“It is better that we get some dry ration so that we can cook. I heard it was being distributed for free, but we don’t know how to go about it. We don’t step out much except for going to the hunger centre for fear of the police hauling us up,” Javed Akhtar, 28, who belongs to Uttar Pradesh’s Ghazipur, said.

He added that a sanitation worker in the area helped the group approach an NGO working for the homeless, which finally came to their rescue on Monday.

“I got several calls from people stuck here on Sunday. They are not registered with the labour welfare board. We are trying to get through the local administration to get them help to survive the rest of the lockdown period,” Sunil Kumar Aledia, a social activist working for the homeless and founder of Centre for Holistic Development (CHD), said.

Meanwhile, a senior official from the Delhi government’s labour department, who did not wish to be named, said, “We will definitely ask the employer regarding the disbursement of wages. We will also ensure food/ration reaches them at the earliest.”