Coronavirus scare in Chennai: Migrant exodus puts small businesses in quandary – Times of India

CHENNAI: With Covid-19 scare gripping the nation, hundreds of migrant workers in the city are packing their bags to go to their home states, leaving small businesses, shops and construction firms in dire straits. With several trains getting cancelled, there’s a rush among them to get home as early as possible as they fear all modes of travels may soon be suspended completely.
Coronavirus in India latest updates
Railway officials said that demand for unreserved tickets has spiked by 30% to 40% on trains headed to the north – Howrah, Patna, New Delhi, Jaipur and other towns. In the last four days there has been a gradual increase, by more than 1,000 tickets per day. On an usual day, MGR Central sells around 5,000 unreserved tickets. This has increased to 10,000 per day in the last few days.
On Friday, the unreserved compartment of Grand Trunk Express to New Delhi was packed with migrant labourers. Several hundreds of people were camping at the station and near the unreserved ticket counter inside Madras Moore Market Complex suburban station. The carrying capacity of an unreserved coach is 90 to 100 passengers. But more than triple of that number travelled in a coach. With Covid-19 cases going up, travelling in such crowded compartments pose a huge risk to hundreds of passengers.
Many of them have come from the suburbs of the city where they have been working at shops, godowns, small units as loaders, cooks, waiters and vendors. The health department has started thermal screening of passengers at the main entrance of MGR Central. Health minister C Vijayabaskar, who inspected the station on Friday evening, said, “We have stepped up checks and screening as much as possible. The focus now is on restricting inter-state travel. We advice people to avoid travel.”
Ashish Kumar from Lucknow, who has camped at the MGR Central for the last couple of days with six of his friends, said, “We have come here from Chengalpet. I used to work in an ice cream shop. The shop is closed due to corona virus scare. People have stopped eating ice creams for fear of getting a cold. We have bought unreserved tickets.” The group is planning to board a convenient train. Many who are not able to board trains because of the rush stay back for the next train. Workers are also leaving as many shops, especially small eateries, have started to cut down on the staff because business is dull due to the virus scare. In small firms, contract staff have been told to leave.
There is a mild dip in the footfalls at the station on Friday when compared to Wednesday as people have started to avoid non-essential travel but the crowd in unreserved coaches of trains has increased. However, the situation is different in Coimbatore where the exodus is yet to start as industrial units, foundries, pumps and auto component manufacturing units are yet to cut workforce. For now, none of the migrant workers have gone jobless in Coimbatore and hence none are leaving the city, say industry association representatives.

• Download

  The Times of India News App for Latest City News

• Subscribe

  Start Your Daily Mornings with Times of India Newspaper! Order Now