New Delhi: Responding to a question by MPs on whether the government had any data on the number of lives lost by migrant workers as they returned to their hometown during the pandemic lockdown, the Centre replied that no such records have been kept.
Hitting out at the government for this, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi tweeted: ‘The Modi government does not know how many migrant workers died in lockdown and how many jobs were lost. If you don’t count, do people not die?’
Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Isaac wrote, ‘Centre doesn’t care about deaths of migrant workers they caused by pushing them in to trains, makeshift carts and on foot to the distant homes. At least acknowledge tentative and incomplete data of rail Shramik Trains and road accidents.’