DHUBRI, Nov 8 - With a hope that their lives will again be normal after the long nationwide lockdown, a team of labourers hailing from different villages of the district and South Salmara Mankachar returned to their workplace thousands of kms away in Tamil Nadu�s Coimbatore.
In a bid to take back the labourers based in the westernmost district of Assam, a bus (TN 66P 8888) came all the way from Tamil Nadu to Dhubri, sent by the owner of a textile company. Sitting in the bus that came from Tamil Nadu to Dhubri, 35-year-old Rofiqul Islam said, �This is not just a bus that came from South India, but a ray of hope that our lives will be normal again�.
He further added, �We have faced innumerable hardships during the last few months. Not only that we were left with no money and jobs in our hands, but the journey back home here was itself miserable and still gives us nightmares.�
�However, today we are desperate to go back to our workplace and start life anew�.
The laborers in the bus admitted that they were struggling to feed their family members since the lockdown and few were forced to sell their jewelleries and even mortgage their meagre landed property in order to survive.
The bus that left Dhubri on Saturday is slated to reach Coimbatore on Wednesday.
�Yes the journey is long, and that too by a bus will be tiring and uncomfortable, but this hardship cannot match what we have faced during homecoming and what we have been facing without a job�, said Sofian Ahmed, another labourer.
Saying that they did not wish to live far away from their village, they nevertheless admitted that they were in fact helpless.
�In Assam, there are not enough jobs. The Coimbatore-based spinning industry pays Rs 500-600 a day and also provides free lodging and fooding facilities to all migrant labourers at their premises,� informed Islam.
