Back from Rajasthan, students from Maharashtra recount lockdown experiences

On Friday, more than 18 buses, arranged by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC), brought the stranded students back to their homes from Kota in Rajasthan. The journey was not smooth for everyone.

After being stuck in hostels and paying-guest accommodations in Kota, Rajasthan, for approximately six weeks of the lockdown, the 1,800 students from Maharashtra are relieved to be home after the state organised buses to bring them back last week.

Thousands of Maharashtra residents have been brought back to the state from various parts of the country where they were stranded due to lockdown imposed on March 25 to curb the spread of coronavirus. (Bachchan Kumar / HT Photo used for representational purpose only)

On Friday, more than 18 buses, arranged by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC), brought the stranded students back to their homes. The journey was not smooth for everyone. “After being dropped off at Mumbai Central at around 11pm, we were told to ask our parents to pick us up. No one had informed us of this earlier and some of us faced a lot of trouble to reach home,” said 18-year-old Suman Kalra (18).

Kalra was among 1,800 students attending various integrated coaching institutes in Kota. She was preparing for the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) for undergraduate medical and dental studies.

“ We were barely nine out of the 60 in my hostel when the state-arranged transport vehicles reached us. Most students from other states had already returned home. The only respite was that we didn’t have to struggle for food. Our hostel was providing meals every day,” said Aditi Thorat, 18, another NEET aspirant and a resident of Karmala district in Solapur. Some states had arranged to transport students from Kota in the first two weeks of April.

For students living as paying guests, living conditions got worse during lockdown. “We usually depend on tiffin services, which were discontinued due to the lockdown. Eventually, we depended on eggs and instant noodles for weeks together. On some days, we couldn’t buy groceries because many of us depend on local buses,” said Kabir Sharma, 19, from Navi Mumbai and a Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) aspirant who had been in Kota for the last two years.

Kota is an education hub with coaching institutes catering to engineering and medical aspirants from all over the country. In peak season, close to 1.5 lakh students join coaching institutes in Kota every year.