Gurugram/April, 23: The Gurugram police on Thursday intercepted 148 migrants trying to cross the Haryana border on their way to Uttar Pradesh. The workers have been sent to relief camps and three truck drivers arrested for violating the lockdown and trying to smuggle them from Ludhiana to Gorakhpur.
The Haryana Government on Thursday sent 31 buses to Kota, the coaching hub of the northern region, to bring back over 850 students stranded due to the lockdown. “The buses have left for Kota to bring back the students. They will be dropped at their respective towns,” said Transport Minister Mool Chand Sharma
As many as 72 migrants were caught from a field along the Kundli-Manesar-Palwal Highway where they had been dropped off and were waiting for another vehicle to take them across. As a truck neared, the migrants, who were hiding in the fields, presumed it had come to pick them up and came out. This alerted the naka police near the Gurugram-Jhajjar border.
The police rounded up the labourers and decided to check the truck and stumbled upon 76 more persons, including two children, huddled together in the vehicle.
Manesar DCP Deepak Saharan said the truck drivers mdash; all residents of Ludhiana mdash; had a pass-like paper pasted on the front screen.
The drivers reportedly confessed to ferrying the labourers to make a quick buck and charged Rs 2,000 per head to hide the migrants in their covered truck and take them to UP. The migrants said they were desperate to get back to the villages.
