Mangaluru, Oct 30: There is a mounting fear about the coronavirus pandemic spreading its wings again in Dakshina Kannada (DK) district where the infection is at a low ebb now, because of the migrant workers from West Bengal.
The Covid wave is easing in Kerala but in West Bengal, lockdown has begun now. For the last one week, several cities in that state are under lockdown. Workers from there are coming to the city directly without any hassles through trains. The influx of Bengali workforce on a large scale is giving sleepless nights to the district administration. The administration is trying its best to achieve zero percent Covid positivity rate but there is apprehension that their ambitions might be swamped by the Bengali migrant workforce.
After a long pause due to the coronavirus second wave, migrant workers activity has blossomed in Dakshina Kannada now. Migrant workers in large numbers are returning. Workers from Bengal are involved with construction, sand extraction, fishing, hotels etc. Currently, Covid infection is on the rise in their state but there is no system by which the migrants can be monitored.
The current system of checks at the state border is mostly limited to Kerala as people coming by trains are not subjected to tighter checks. The railway stations are the points through which the migrant workers arrive in large numbers. During the 2019 lockdown, arrival and departure of migrant labourers used to be recorded in the government's Seva Sindhu web portal. As per the statistics of the labour department, 22,956 migrant workers from nine states came here including 1,505 from West Bengal. Out of 276 workers who left during the second lockdown, 129 were from West Bengal. But after that, there is no information about the movement of migrant workers either with the labour department or district administration.
Dakshina Kannada district deputy commissioner, Dr Rajendra K V, said that there is no specific direction from the state government about Covid19. He said that those who get the workers will be asked to provide details in the labour department without fail and instructed to get those workers who have already come to RT-PCR tests. Government guidance about checking the people coming though railway stations will be sought, he added.