Ahmedabd halts as migrant workers head home for Diwali

Meenaben (37),who works as a maid in the city,requested several of her employers to give her a little extra money as “bonus” on Thursday so that she can spend Diwali with her son in Dungarpur. Her husband is a mason in the city.

“I’m going to shop a little for my son and in-laws and then take the bus from Gita Mandir with my husband. I hope there is some space left in the bus,” said Meenaben,who goes home twice a year,during Diwali and Holi.

According to Vipul Pandya,general secretary of the Bandhkam Mazdoor Sangathan,construction work in the city will come to a complete halt for almost two weeks and will resume around November 15,if not later.

But it is not always a happy holiday for all. Pandya said many migrant workers do not get proper buses or share taxis or jeeps at the last moment and end up hitching rides home on goods-laden trucks and lorries.

“At least one or two fatal accidents happen every year,” he said,recalling how 17 people on board a truck died after it overturned in Anand on Tuesday. Among them were four women and three toddlers. The truck was carrying sand and gravel and the people were buried under it. But the mass exodus is causing inconvenience to many.

Devang Dave in the Satellite area said he approached several contractors for plumbers to repair some pipes at his apartment. “But all the contractors whom I approached said their employees had gone home for Diwali. The few who had a couple of plumbers are working and can’t take more work,” said Dave.