THE CPI(M) Delhi state committee, CITU, JMS, DYFI, SFI and other mass organisations, have  reacted to the demands of migrant as well as other workers amidst the lockout due to Covid-19 pandemic. The announcement of the lockdown without any ameliorative measures saw mass migrations of workers to neighbouring states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and even distant states like Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

Going by the hundreds of distress calls in the first few hours of the help line installed by the Party, it was clear that the working class in Delhi won’t be able to survive the lockdown without dry rations. This was brought to the notice of the Delhi government and simultaneously the volunteers of all the mass organisations also stepped in to provide dry rations to supplement the government efforts. The generous philanthropic contributions, as a response to the call given by the state CITU, helped in buying dry rations for the workers. 

Covid-19 has brought in a stark reminder of the status of Delhi’s ration card holders which was whittled down to 17 lakhs in 2014-15 (from 34.35 lakhs). This would cover a little over 70 lakh people of Delhi’s total 1.90 crore population. This was mainly due to the annual income ceiling of one lakh rupees and other exclusion criteria under Antyodaya Anna Yojana and Priority Group (PR). Although the minimum wages in Delhi were recently increased, due to the poor enforcement machinery, this has mostly remained only on paper. All these pro-business and neoliberal realities have been laid bare open by the lockdown episode. The trade unions have time and again explained that the minimum wages offered to the workers is just a bare minimum which doesn’t take care of their daily/monthly reproduction. Barely seven days into the lockdown, the majority working class households had neither rations in stock nor the money to buy it.

The Party in Delhi with the active intervention of its Polit Bureau member, Brinda Karat, was in continuous touch with the government to bring concrete cases of deprivation to their notice. However, it seems the government machinery is yet to gear up to deal with the huge numbers. This, along with the demand for dry rations from non-Aadhaar holders, has taken the situation on the ground to alarming levels by the end of the second week of April. While the Party would continue to put pressure upon the government to extend dry ration to all of Delhi’s workers, its present work of supplementing it to the extent possible also would continue in the coming days.

The following gives a gist of the relief effort being undertaken by the Party these days. Only a bare minimum number of curfew passes (10) were issued by the Delhi government to undertake a relief work of such magnitude for the state. However many volunteers with permission are working in their own respective localities and have therefore been able to run community kitchens. In fact the local Party functionaries and the leaders of the mass organisations have put in their best efforts to reach out to maximum people.

Party DC-LC’s/ mass organisations                                                                         Dry ration distribution                                                   Food packets through Community Kitchen
Manakpura, Karolbagh LC                                                                                              135 people                                                                     300 packets daily for 12 days
Inderpuri, Karolbagh LC                                                                                                                                                                                         275 packets for 7 days
Narela, Jain colony and Sahabad diary, Outer north LC’s                                              700 people                                                                      1200 packets daily
North LC’s                                                                                                                       412 people
South West LC’s                                                                                                              81 people
Ghaziabad DC                                                                                                                 2000 people                                                                     1600 packets daily
Communal violence hit NE Delhi                                                                                    1000 people
CITU                                                                                                                                8898 workers
DYFI                                                                                                                                840 people
Bangla Manch                                                                                                                 1530 people                                                                     125 packets
Jan Sanskriti                                                                                                                    70 people                                                                         100 packets daily since 10th April
DTF                                                                                                                                 1500 people                                                                      500 packets daily to start with and now reached 1100
Vijay Nagar-Maurice Nagar, SFI                                                                                      70 people                                                                         60 packets daily since 10th April
North, Outer north and Central, JMS                                                                               80 people

The relief effort in the communal violence hit north-east Delhi since March 1, has been continuing during the lockdown period as well. Dry rations have been distributed to more than 1000 persons and heightened effort to bring them into the ration fold of the state government is also on. The Party was able to intervene and ensure distribution of milk for children from the government in some pockets. The distribution of clothes (100 families) and empty gas cylinders also continued. The relief effort to migrant workers from the CITU could so far cover 43.2 per cent workers from Bengal, 15.2 per cent from Bihar, 15 per cent from UP and 26.6 per cent from all other states. JMS volunteers took the lead in maintaining the help desk, in running the community kitchen and distribution of stitched masks in localities.

Besides this, the Party has been involved in registering people for e-rations, bringing to the notice of authorities the need for rations and milk at localities and a regular auditing of the gruel centres in terms of the quality and quantity of food served. Our volunteers have helped hundreds of workers to register online for ration cards which is a difficult job for them to do on their own. The Party also intervened for the nursing community on Covid-19 duty at Lok Nayak Hospital who were denied accommodation. The Party was able to undertake a detailed telephonic survey among the distressed workers to arrive at a credible plan of action in the coming days.

RELIEF EFFORT IN NEW AREAS

The Covid-19 lockdown relief effort has brought workers from varied scheduled employments to the Party’s fold. The migrant embroidery workers from Shahpur Jat, garment and textile workers in Gandhi Nagar, bag makers at Nabi Karim, jewellery workers at Karol Bagh, domestic help/maids at Jamrudpur, shawl sellers at Daryaganj, construction workers from throughout the city and junk-rag-scrap collectors at Chattarpur. Most of the migrant labourers coming from Bengal, Bihar, UP and Kashmir have knowledge about the work of the CPI(M) or the Party with the red flag. In fact, the Delhi party could reconnect with comrades from Bengal who were forced to flee by Trinamool goons for their unwavering commitment to the Party. In the coming days, the Party and the mass organisations need to consolidate on these gains to advance the interests of the working people in Delhi.