Mamata urges Amarinder to help Bengali workers stranded in Punjab

Shubhadeep Choudhury

Tribune News Service

Kolkata, March 26

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has urged her Punjab counterpart to provide the Bengali workers stranded in Punjab with basic shelter, food and medical support in this hour of crisis.

In a letter to Amarinder Singh today, the West Bengal CM wrote that many skilled and unskilled workers from Bengal were working in different parts of the country including Punjab. As a result of the complete lockdown in force in the country to arrest the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Bengali workers are unable to travel back to their homes and are stuck at their places of work.

In her letter to the Punjab CM, Banerjee wrote that the West Bengal government was getting frantic calls from the stranded workers. These workers, Didi wrote, were generally in groups of 50 to 100 and could be easily identified by the respective local administrations. She wrote that since it was not possible for the West Bengal government to reach out to these workers for help, the Punjab government could step in and provide support to them.

West Bengal government is also taking care of people from other states who are stuck here due to the lockdown, Mamata wrote.

West Bengal Chief Secretary would pass on to his Punjab counterpart the details of the stranded workers so that humanitarian support could be extended to them with promptness, Mamata wrote in her letter addressed to the Punjab CM.

Banerjee today sent similar letters to chief ministers of 17 more states, including Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Uttaranchal, Rajasthan and Kerala.