Addressing the nation on India’s COVID-19 situation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the state governments should ensure the well-being of migrants. 

“I request State governments to urge the workers to stay where they are. This trust given by the states to the workers will help them, and that they will be vaccinated in the city where they are,” PM Modi said.

With states imposing varying degrees of restrictions, PM Modi urged migrant workers to stay where they were. He made a reference to the situation during the nationwide lockdown last year, when tens of thousands of migrant workers were forced to walk back home. 

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Pictures of hundreds of migrants boarding buses to leave for their home states have been floating on the internet since the last week. In fact, Arvind Kejriwal’s appeal too, couldn’t stop these migrants from leaving Delhi.

Earlier in his address, PM Modi had said that “the second wave of coronavirus infections has hit like a storm.” He expressed his condolences to the families of those who died of COVID-19.

He insisted that “lockdown should be the last resort and focus should be on micro-containment.”

India is reeling under a ferocious second wave of coronavirus, with over 200,000 daily new cases being reported for the past several days. States have imposed varying degrees of restrictions to rein in the massive COVID-19 outbreak.

New coronavirus cases in India crossed the 15 million mark after more than 2,50,000 cases were recorded on Tuesday.