Homebound: Soaring Prices Amid LPG Crisis Force Migrant Workers To Return Home
As movement through the Strait of Hormuz still finds itself restricted, imports coming into the country, that meet nearly 60% of India’s LPG demand, have been delayed. The crisis is hitting the urban poor and daily wage earners the hardest, disrupting daily meals, shutting businesses, and driving people toward expensive black-market cylinders. Besides cold stoves, with rising prices in hotels and eateries and most of them forced to shut owing to soaring prices, migrant workers, from states like Bihar, who depend on the same, are heading back to their villages in search of alternatives.
Rita, a tea seller who used to make tea on a stove, currently uses an earthen stove due to the ongoing LPG cylinder shortage. She also plans to move back to her village if things don’t change in the coming week or two. Ghazipur, New Delhi | Photo: Tribhuvan Tiwari/Outlook
The ongoing LPG crisis, coupled with recent remarks by Prime minister Narendra Modi, has triggered fresh anxiety among migrant workers at construction sites across Mumbai and its surrounding regions, reviving memories of the exodus witnessed during the COVID-19 pandemic | Photo: Dinesh Parab/Outlook
Earlier, nearly 3,000 workers were employed here. Now only 200 to 300 remain. Most have returned to their villages in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh due to the crisis. Many construction sites are now lying almost empty according to Munna Yadav, a worker at one such site Mumbai, Maharashtra | Photo: Dinesh Parab/Outlook
Rakesh, a factory worker heading back to his native village fearing a lockdown type situation, from Anand Vihar bus stand, New Delhi | Photo: Tribhuvan Tiwari/Outlook
Migrant workers leaving for their hometowns from Kaushambi bus stand in Uttar Pradesh. | Photo: Suresh K. Pandey/Outlook
Migrant workers leaving for their hometowns from Kaushambi bus stand in Uttar Pradesh. | Photo: Suresh K. Pandey/Outlook
Amal came to Kolkata from Bihar about four months ago for work. He works at a roadside food stall where he makes rotis. From 3 PM to 3 AM, he prepares rotis using nearly 30 kg of flour. Earlier, this work was done using gas, but due to a shortage of gas, he now has to cook using a traditional clay stove (earthen oven). This makes his work very difficult, as he has to stand in front of the intense heat for long hours. His employer has sent his entire family back to their hometown because, without gas, they are unable to cook at home. | Photo: Sandipan Chatterjee/Outlook
Migrant daily wage workers leaving for their hometown from Anand Vihar bus stand | Photo: Tribhuvan Tiwari/Outlook
Migrant daily wage workers leaving for their hometown Anand Vihar bus stand | Photo: Tribhuvan Tiwari/Outlook
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