The Legal Aid and Awareness Committee [hereinafter the committee] of NLU Jodhpur along with the support of student community came forward to contribute their bit in the prevailing challenging times. The pandemic has managed to take a toll on people of all diaspora of the society, but, the most affected from it being the migrant labourers who are stuck in the cities in penury.
The committee came forward to accommodate the migrant labourers stuck in Gujarat with little money and dwindling food supplies, to their respective homes in Jharkhand. With the help of a local Non-Governmental Organisation named Prayas Center for Labour Research and Action[hereinafter CLRA], they carried out research and found that there were primarily two groups of people: One, the labourers who were stuck in various parts of Gujarat and were unable to reach their homes;second group of people included labourers who had reached their respective homes in Jharkhand, but were facing shortage of food supplies, ration, etc.
For the first group, the committee with the help of CLRA, acquired the contact details of the migrant labourers, traced their locationsand conducted telephonic interviews to understand their needs and prepared a database of such labourers. In totality, the total number of people contacted were more than 19,000.Subsequently, the database was forwarded to various NGOs working on ground level and CLRA in order to make arrangements to migrate them safely to their respective homes. Additionally, the committee made a separatedatabase for all the urgent cases where swift action was required, and with the help of certain localities and CLRA were able to distribute food kits and ration to them. The committee has also been able to gather Aadhar Card details of all the labourers who wish to take a Shramik train back home in order to ensure their registration can be done.
In order to address the second group of people facing food supply shortages in Jharkhand and Biharthe committee has collaborated with the Jharkhand Legal Services Authority and various other authorities and NGOs have also been approached for the same.The committee would like to pay their regards to the Jharkhand Police and administrative and police officers of the state, who patiently replied to all the tweets which were put out by the volunteers of the committee to address urgent cases. Not only did they take cognizance of the urgencies, but also quickly provided help to them. They were also very kind for having shared the pictures of some of the people helped, with the committee.
The committee expresses gratitude towards the alumni of NLU, Jodhpur who came forward and lent a helping hand in the project. It also applauds the initiatives taken by the students of GNLU,Gandhinagar,which worked as an inspiration forus. The committee also extends thanks to students from Amity Law School, Noida, HPNLU, Shimla, CNLU, Patna, JGLS, Sonepat, RGNUL, Patiala, RML Lucknow, NUJS Kolkata and students of various other law schools who volunteered to make calls, contacting the labourers and prepare the database.
The positive results that came out from the collective efforts, has motivated the committee members to continue with their efforts in lieu of their moto that there still is a long way ahead. In furtherance of this moto, the committee plans on expanding the distribution of food kits to the labourers stuck in Gujarat and Bihar.
