Bhubaneswar: Sixty-two migrant labourers from Odisha, most of them women and adolescent girls from the Juang tribe, a particularly vulnerable tribal group (PVTG) in Keonjhar district, returned home from Tamil Nadu on Saturday.The labour department facilitated return of the workers, who arrived traumatised by the ammonia gas leak tragedy at the seafood processing factory in Tamil Nadu’s Tiruvallur district. All the returnees belong to economically vulnerable families. Many migrated to Tamil Nadu in March and few in Oct last year.Many returnees alleged that they have not been paid for months and had to endure exploitative working conditions. Most labourers from Keonjhar told TOI that they were taken by Srikant Juanga of Rangamatia village, who was a supervisor at the factory.They said they had been promised a monthly salary of Rs 15,000 on the condition that they work 12-hour shifts every day without a weekly off. The cost of food was deducted from the salary, and taking even a single day leave resulted in a deduction of Rs 1,000 from their wages.Pratibha Juanga, 19, from Keonjhar district’s Kodipasa, travelled to Tamil Nadu in March along with 16 others from her village. Eldest of four siblings, Pratibha had never travelled outside Keonjhar before. “I wanted to earn enough to make life easier for my family. But that was not to be,” she said. “I worked for 20 days in March and then continuously over the following months without a break. I was paid only for March after one day’s wage was deducted because I wasn’t wearing a mask on one occasion. Wearing a mask throughout the shift was compulsory. The salaries for the remaining months were due to be paid recently, but then the accident took place,” she said. All but five workers from Kodipasa, who are still undergoing treatment in Chennai, have returned.Several workers alleged that Srikant had collected their original Aadhaar cards before they left for Tamil Nadu and never returned them. Jaiswini Juanga (21) and Nandini Juanga (23), school dropouts from Dharapada village in Keonjhar, said another contractor collected the cards from Srikant after they joined the factory.Jaiswini, who lost her father during her school days, and Nandini, whose mother died recently, were supporting their families by selling forest produce when Srikant offered them jobs at the factory. “After the mishap, when we repeatedly asked him to return our Aadhaar cards, he refused. Fortunately, we had photographs of our Aadhaar cards on our mobile phones, which helped us board the train to Odisha,” said Jaiswini.Meanwhile, another labourer Kabita Juanga of Raisuan village in Keonjhar died on Saturday, taking the death toll of workers from the state to 13. State labour commissioner Indramani Tripathy said efforts are on to bring back workers still recovering in hospitals. He said the local labour office is currently engaged in receiving the bodies of the deceased, ensuring the safe return of all workers and completing the formalities. “The local labour office will soon file a police complaint against Srikant Juanga, who is alleged to have recruited the labourers for work at the factory,” he said.
