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Almost 100 migrants died on Covid-19 relief trains, Indian Government admits

India is currently enduring the world's fastest-growing Covid-19 epidemic with over five million cases - Adnan Abidi/Reuters
India is currently enduring the world's fastest-growing Covid-19 epidemic with over five million cases - Adnan Abidi/Reuters
Coronavirus Article Bar with counter ..
Coronavirus Article Bar with counter ..

Almost 100 Indians died on board special government-run relief trains while returning to their hometowns and villages, the Indian Government has admitted.

The Indian Railways ran 4,621 “Shramik” trains between May and August to transport migrant workers and their families who were stranded in India’s cities without work due to its draconian lockdown.

At the time, migrants complained there was no food or water on board and congested trains had no air conditioning and often broke down or got lost, causing major delays.

The Indian media reported there had been fatalities on the trains but the Indian Government did not comment at the time.

In May, the Telegraph India documented how a four-year-old died on a train from New Delhi to the city of Patna in Bihar, after temperatures hit 40 degrees and delays meant passengers did not receive food for an entire day.

Later that month, shocking footage on NDTV showed a toddler playing with the cloth which had covered his 23-year-old mother who died while travelling to the state of Bihar from Gujarat.

As recently as Tuesday, the Indian Government had said it did not have data on workers who lost their lives during the pandemic.

But today, Piyush Goyal, the Indian Minister of Railways, confirmed 97 people had died while travelling on board the “Shramik” relief trains.

Mr Goyal said 51 post-mortems had been carried out so far with deaths attributed to chronic conditions like heart disease, liver disease and lung disease. Reportedly, some of the fatalities were also caused by Covid-19.

Ten million internal migrants returned home during the Covid-19 epidemic, some taking the virus with them - Rajat Gupta/Shutterstock
Ten million internal migrants returned home during the Covid-19 epidemic, some taking the virus with them - Rajat Gupta/Shutterstock

Meanwhile, India threatens to become the first country to add 100,000 new daily cases after reporting 97,894 infections yesterday.

On Tuesday, it had become only the second country after the United States to reach the grim milestone of five million Covid-19 cases, with the latest million added in just 11 days.

Cases are now surging in its vulnerable rural hinterland with five states - Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu - accounting for 60 percent of total cases.

While two-thirds of India’s 1.38 billion people live in rural areas, only 20 percent of doctors and 37 percent of hospital beds are located here.

The Indian Government’s mismanagement of its 139 million strong internal migrant population is a major factor in the spread of Covid-19 to rural areas.

On March 25, Narendra Modi, the Indian Prime Minister, suddenly placed the country under a strict two-month lockdown in an attempt to slow the spread of Covid-19.

Indians were only permitted to leave their homes to purchase food or medicines and at least 120 million Indians lost their jobs in April alone.

Migrant labourers, who form the backbone of India’s urban economy, suddenly found themselves stranded in cities and without any form of income as construction sites and factories closed and they were unable to run street stalls.

Many did not possess cash savings and attempted to walk for hundreds of kilometres to their hometowns and villages.

In total, ten million Indians returned home via trains, buses and on foot in the largest migration in India since Partition.

The majority of returnees travelled after lockdown restrictions eased on June 1 and by this point, Covid-19 was already widespread in India’s cities and so many starving migrants also took the virus with them to previously unaffected remote towns and villages.

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