Millions of people fled the cities in India
NEW DELHI, Aug 19 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Less than a third of India’s 80 million unregistered migrant workers who were hit by the country’s lengthy coronavirus lockdown received government food aid, official figures show.
In May, India announced a food aid programme for these unregistered workers, who had begun returning home during the lockdown that started in late March and lasted for more than two months.
This involved distributing 800,000 tonnes of emergency food relief during May and June. But as of Aug 5, official figures show that only 246,000 tonnes had been distributed to about 25 million migrants – that’s just 31% of the estimated total amount that was promised.
The programme was aimed at those who are not registered for India’s national food ration scheme because they keep moving around to find work.
According to media reports, Indian government officials have complained at internal meetings that there were bottlenecks at the state government level which had slowed down the process of food distribution to this group of migrant workers. — NNN-AGENCIES
