Migrant worker delivers baby by roadside in Telangana

[Anta Assamey]

Hyderabad: A migrant woman worker from Chhattisgarh delivered a baby by the roadside in Telangana's Medak district early Tuesday.

The woman was walking with her husband and some other migrant workers along National Highway 44 to reach her home state.

The incident occurred at Japthi Shivanur village when the woman identified as Anitha Bai developed labour pains. With no vehicle available to shift her to the hospital, women accompanying her helped her deliver the baby by roadside.

Alerted by some locals, a police sub-inspector arranged a private ambulance and shifted the woman to a government-run hospital at Ramayampet.

"After receiving a call about the incident, the sub-inspector arranged an ambulance and both the woman and the new-born were shifted to hospital. Both of them are safe," Nagarjuna Goud, Circle Inspector, Ramayampet, told IANS.

The woman along with her husband and others had walked for 70 kms as part of their journey to return home.

Risking their lives, migrant workers from various parts of Telangana are trying to return to their home states on foot. Last month, a 12-year-old girl had died while returning to Chhattisgarh.

The girl working in chilli fields in Telangana's Jayashankar Bhupalapally district along with some others walked for three days to reach her home in Bijapur district of Chhattisgarh. However, she collapsed and died just an hour away from her home.

Migrant workers lined up at police stations in different parts of Hyderabad and other places in Telangana to register their names to return home.

Large number of workers gathered at Kukatpally police station in Hyderabad to register their names. The police had a tough time in controlling the crowd.

The Telangana government has announced that 40 special trains will be operated from the state every day over the next one week to send migrant workers back to their respective states.

The trains from Hyderabad, Warangal, Khammam, Ramagundam, Damaracharla and other places will be operated to Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal and other states.

The government said migrant workers who have registered their names with the police stations would be allowed to travel by the special trains. The details of the travel will be given at the police stations.

Migrant workers in various parts of neighbouring Andhra Pradesh Acontinued their protest on Tuesday, demanding the authorities to send them back to their home states. Workers from Rajasthan, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and other states staged protests in the temple town of Tirupati.

Meanwhile, there were also protests in Guntur district. The labourers working at under construction buildings of All India Institute of Medical Sciences at Mangalagiri staged a protest over the delay in sending them back to their homes.

Officials assured the workers that arrangements would soon be made for their travel. There are an estimated 1100 migrant workers in Mangalagiri and surrounding villages.

[sattipandu]