Covid-19: Stranded migrants can work during lockdown, but conditions apply

No interstate movement allowed; registration with local authorities must

The Union government on Sunday said that workers stranded in relief camps could go to work within the states they were in but didn’t give permission to let them go back to their home states or allow any interstate movement. The home ministry issued a “standard operating system for movement of stranded labour” to allow workers to resume work from April 20 when additional economic activities will begin in areas not
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designated as “containment zones”.

The government has said that migrant workers residing in relief camps in various states should be registered with the local authorities “and their skill-mapping be carried out to find out their suitability for various kinds of work”. “In the event…migrants wish to return to their place of work, within the state where they are presently located, they would be screened and those asymptomatic would be transported to their respective places of work,” the guidelines said.

However, many states in India have witnessed a surge in coronavirus disease cases that reported asymptomatic symptoms or in other words, without any symptoms associated with the disease. Also, the government did not elaborate on the procedure to screen such workers. For instance, in Maharashtra, 70-75 per cent of over 3,000 Covid-19 positive cases were asymptomatic. In Karnataka, this ratio stood at around 60 per cent. In Delhi, all 186 Covid-19 cases reported on Sunday were asymptomatic…