After reports of ‘attack’ on migrants, Jharkhand officials say ‘everything is calm’ in Tamil Nadu workers’ camps

The source said one of the Jharkhand workers in Chennai had also made a ‘false video’. “We visited the site from where we had received a video complaint. A worker had asked for leaves for Holi and was sanctioned, however, two days back he got drunk and started making videos of sleeping workers that had been severely beaten… All are safe.”

The source said the rumours started after a group of workers from Bihar clashed with a group of workers from another state. “Dispute began because a worker was smoking and deliberately puffing smoke on another worker’s face. This incident was filmed and made viral through social media that locals are beating migrant workers,” added the source.

Three days ago family members of a frantic Sanjay Sharma appealed to Garhwa district administration in Jharkhand for their son’s safe return home after the news of an alleged assault on a migrant worker in Chennai went viral. Sharma and his six friends, who worked in civil construction, said they wanted to come back as they did not feel ‘safe’.

They are going back via train and will reach Jharkhand on Sunday.

Speaking from the train, Sharma told The Indian Express: “Nothing happened with us, but there is a certain fear that people are attacking workers from Bihar and Jharkhand. That is why we appealed to the district administration and we are on our way back.”

Sources in the Jharkhand government said Chief Minister Hemant Soren received four messages, including a voice note, from migrant workers pleading to return to Jharkhand. The plea triggered a response from the state government to send a team to Tamil Nadu to take stock of the situation.

Jharkhand Labour Department Secretary Rajesh Kumar Sharma in a letter to Tamil Nadu’s Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Labour, Welfare and Skill Development, on March 3, requested the official’s support in facilitating a delegation’s visits to work sites.

“…this is to inform that a delegation consisting of the officials of the Department of Labour representative of Safe and Responsible Migration Initiative (SRMI) will be visiting TN to review the situation of migrant workers in view of the recent series of events reported through various media sources and complaint received from the migrant workers…The officials will be visiting worksites and districts from where the complaints of stranded migrant workers are being reported by State Migrant Control Room of Jharkhand,” Sharma said.