Butchers of Sopore and Birmingham

Nine years of calm before icy storm

Kashmir turns crimson with blood of Pandits

AN UN-ISLAMIC KIDNAPPING AND CHAOS IN THE VALLEY

The illusion of azaadi and Kashmir’s historic deception

How Pak's terror policy evolved in Kashmir

Birth of social media jihadists, death of Article-370

Operation Sindoor: When Indian missiles rained on Pak terror parade

<div class='ite_mg_banner ads__container'><div class='it_mg_bnrBox'><div class='ite_bnr_cont'><div class='ite_cont_dtl'> <h4>Mood of the Nation Offer:  Use promo code <span class='bold_text'> MOTN2026 </span> to get<span class='bold_text'> ₹500 off</span> on all Print + Digital subscriptions</h4><a href='https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.dev?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsubscriptions.intoday.in%2Findiatoday%3Futm_source%3Dtop-web-banner ' class='ite_subscribe_btn origin_conscent_url' target='_blank'>SUBSCRIBE</a></div></div></div></div>

US Election coverage

India

World

NewsMo

Fact Check

Programmes

Match Schedule

Teams

Player Stats

Match Report

LIVE SCORES

<p><strong>Lockdown</strong></p><p>Rakesh Paswan, a 30-year-old mason from East Champaran in Bihar, made a scarce living in the national capital region until the lockdown on March 25. Struggling with unemployment and hunger, when the shutdown was extended till May 3, he cycled 1,100 kilometres to go home. It took him a week. He is still quarantined in his village, but his family is determined that he will not return to the city. Meanwhile, factory owners in the cities are complaining of the shortage of labour. Saurabh Baweja, who runs a factory making home appliances, says there are over 2,000 such units in Delhi employing &ldquo;a lakh or more workers from UP and Bihar, more than half of them are gone and the other half are looking to leave&rdquo;.</p><p>As the lockdown was extended yet again, with the loosening of some restrictions, the Centre told states to &ldquo;mutually agree&rdquo; to permit migrants to return home. On May 1, the Railways annou&shy;nced that it would run six Shramik Specials, trains that would transport workers through state lines. Who was eligible for these journeys was not clarified, so thousands showed up, hoping they could get a train home. When the Centre did issue a clarification, it did little to help.</p><p>The Centre has some questions to answer about its lockdown, about the condition in which migrant workers have had to survive and why it has taken so long to allow them to go home. According to Manoj Jha, spokesman for the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the single largest party in the Bihar assembly (albeit in opposition), the &ldquo;priority of stranded labourers is to get home and the governments at both the Centre and the state should have arra&shy;nged for this to happen&rdquo;.</p><div class="itemcenter"><amp-iframe height="62" title="" width="320" sandbox="allow-forms allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-top-navigation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation" allowfullscreen src="https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.dev?url=https%3A%2F%2Fakm-img-a-in.tosshub.com%2Fsites%2Findiatoday%2Fbanner%2Fpreferred-source-new.html%3Fv%3D1.014%5Cu0026native%3D1" class="mrBt15 preferred-source-banner"> </amp-iframe></div></p><p>He says &ldquo;the issue was further politicised when some BJP-led state governments violated lockdown rules to bring back students as well as thousands of labourers, while other states heeded the guidelines&rdquo;. On May 1, International Labour Day, the first Shramik Spe&shy;&shy;cial left Telangana for Jharkhand, carrying 1,200 migrant workers. Equally symbolically, on the same day, 18 workers were found in Madhya Pradesh, hiding in the drum of a cement mixing truck. They were trying to make the 1,400 km journey from Mumbai to their homes in Uttar Pradesh. The heat in the drum, one worker told reporters, was more bearable than hunger.</p><div class="itgimage"><amp-img src="https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.dev?url=https%3A%2F%2Fakm-img-a-in.tosshub.com%2Findiatoday%2Fimages%2Fbodyeditor%2F202005%2FUpfront-1-3-May18-2_1200x675-x886.jpg%3FZqlJSHy23ak1rbQyiugHTgjA3ZK6R180%3Fsize%3D750:*" alt="" height="886" width="1200" class="" layout="responsive"></amp-img>
<div class="body_caption"> </div>
</div></p><p>If confusion and controversy over who was eligible to board the Shramik Specials was not enough, there was also the question of who was footing the bill. BJP leader Subramanian Swamy took to social media to lambast the government for forcing labourers to pay for their train tickets. Congress spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala accused the government of &ldquo;charging fares to labourers earning Rs 200-300 a day, while in March, Indians stranded in China were flown home for no charge&rdquo;. He also pointed out that the Railways, which was insisting that the fares be paid, had donated Rs 151 crore to the PM-CARES fund. Party president Sonia Gandhi said the Congress would pay the labourers&rsquo; fares.</p><p>Stung, the BJP said the government was already bearing 85 per cent of the expense of the tickets and had asked states to pay the remaining 15 per cent. This, critics say, is a sleight of hand, more a convoluted calculation based on fewer passengers due to social distancing norms and the ticket subsidies on offer during regular times. The point about fares, and the cavalier treatment of migrant workers, was lost in yet another bare-knuckle political brawl. And then Karnataka decided it didn&rsquo;t want to send migrant workers home, regardless of what the workers themselves might want. Belatedly waking up to the irony of trying to reawaken the state&rsquo;s moribund economy while sending all the workers home, the Karnataka government said its factories needed employees. By restricting freedom of movement and choice, said critics, the workers were being treated like indentured labour.</p><p>Former Rajya Sabha MP and economist Bhalchandra Mungekar says this only shows &ldquo;the utter failure of government policies&rdquo;. &ldquo;When the government knew that 90 per cent of the workers were engaged in the unorganised sector and this sector was being shut down, the first thing they should have done is make arrangements to send them home,&rdquo; he says. Had this been done, he argues, they might have been ready to return to the cities now as states seek to reopen their economies. Mungekar says the challenge today is that at the end of the lockdown, there will be no workers in the factories; the ones who are gone are unlikely to return for at least 2-4 months.</p><p>According to the figures of the ministry of home affairs, over 100,000 migrants have returned home on the special trains since May 1. But the numbers seeking to return are huge, with two million registered in Gujarat, 860,000 in Punjab and 361,190 in Kerala alone.</p><p>This is going to hit hard when business finally tries to pick up. There will be a labour crisis in almost all industrial cities and clusters in the country. Take Wazirabad in Delhi, for instance, where Baweja has his factory. He says a large number of migrants had already left the area following the riots in February. And with the exodus now, by the time the factories start working, just 10 per cent of the labour will be available, he says.</p><p>Construction, alre&shy;ady in limbo, could see another static spell. Small real estate developers, particularly, say they cannot cope with labour shortages and, if some workers do return, with the likely wage increases. Ramesh Sharma, a partner at a Ghaziabad real estate firm, says small firms like his &ldquo;are dependent on contractors for labour&rdquo;. Before the lockdown, he says, &ldquo;labourers were paid Rs 400-500 per day. But now costs will rise. I don&rsquo;t know if we&rsquo;ll even be able to start work when the lockdown is lifted&rdquo;.</p><p>An executive at a Ludhiana-based textile company says his industry is used to labour shortages during harvest season, but &ldquo;not a crisis on this scale&rdquo;. Right now, he adds, &ldquo;factories are not even at half-strength, how can things go straight back to normal once the lockdown is lifted? Expensive labour will be a major problem for industry.&rdquo; There is no two ways about it, the lockdown and unclear government policies have put both lives and livelihoods in peril.</p><p><em><strong>with Ashish Misra and Shubham Shankhdhar</strong></em></p><div id="tab-link-wrapper-plugin"><div class="authors__container"><div class="authors__by"><div class="authlable">Published By: </div><div class="authdetaisl">Iram Ara Ibrahim</div></div><div class="published__on"><div class="authlable">Published On: </div><div class="authdetaisl">May 9, 2020</div></div></div><div class="sendros">--- ENDS ---</div></div>

up-front

UP Front

<p><strong>Lockdown</strong></p><p>Rakesh Paswan, a 30-year-old mason from East Champaran in Bihar, made a scarce living in the national capital region until the lockdown on March 25. Struggling with unemployment and hunger, when the shutdown was extended till May 3, he cycled 1,100 kilometres to go home. It took him a week. He is still quarantined in his village, but his family is determined that he will not return to the city. Meanwhile, factory owners in the cities are complaining of the shortage of labour. Saurabh Baweja, who runs a factory making home appliances, says there are over 2,000 such units in Delhi employing &ldquo;a lakh or more workers from UP and Bihar, more than half of them are gone and the other half are looking to leave&rdquo;.</p><p>As the lockdown was extended yet again, with the loosening of some restrictions, the Centre told states to &ldquo;mutually agree&rdquo; to permit migrants to return home. On May 1, the Railways annou&shy;nced that it would run six Shramik Specials, trains that would transport workers through state lines. Who was eligible for these journeys was not clarified, so thousands showed up, hoping they could get a train home. When the Centre did issue a clarification, it did little to help.</p><p>The Centre has some questions to answer about its lockdown, about the condition in which migrant workers have had to survive and why it has taken so long to allow them to go home. According to Manoj Jha, spokesman for the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the single largest party in the Bihar assembly (albeit in opposition), the &ldquo;priority of stranded labourers is to get home and the governments at both the Centre and the state should have arra&shy;nged for this to happen&rdquo;.</p><div class="itemcenter"><iframe scrolling="no" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" width="100%" height="62" awidth="320" aheight="62" amplayout="fixed" src="https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.dev?url=https%3A%2F%2Fakm-img-a-in.tosshub.com%2Fsites%2Findiatoday%2Fbanner%2Fpreferred-source-new.html%3Fv%3D1.014" class="preferred-source-banner" loading="lazy"></iframe></div><style>.preferred-source-banner{  margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom:10px;}</style></p><p>He says &ldquo;the issue was further politicised when some BJP-led state governments violated lockdown rules to bring back students as well as thousands of labourers, while other states heeded the guidelines&rdquo;. On May 1, International Labour Day, the first Shramik Spe&shy;&shy;cial left Telangana for Jharkhand, carrying 1,200 migrant workers. Equally symbolically, on the same day, 18 workers were found in Madhya Pradesh, hiding in the drum of a cement mixing truck. They were trying to make the 1,400 km journey from Mumbai to their homes in Uttar Pradesh. The heat in the drum, one worker told reporters, was more bearable than hunger.</p><div class="itgimage"><div class="itgimage"><img  height="886"  title=""  width="1200"  class="" alt="" src="https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.dev?url=https%3A%2F%2Fakm-img-a-in.tosshub.com%2Findiatoday%2Fimages%2Fbodyeditor%2F202005%2FUpfront-1-3-May18-2_1200x675-x886.jpg%3FZqlJSHy23ak1rbQyiugHTgjA3ZK6R180%3Fsize%3D750:*" loading="lazy" /></div>
<div class="body_caption"> </div>
</div></p><p>If confusion and controversy over who was eligible to board the Shramik Specials was not enough, there was also the question of who was footing the bill. BJP leader Subramanian Swamy took to social media to lambast the government for forcing labourers to pay for their train tickets. Congress spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala accused the government of &ldquo;charging fares to labourers earning Rs 200-300 a day, while in March, Indians stranded in China were flown home for no charge&rdquo;. He also pointed out that the Railways, which was insisting that the fares be paid, had donated Rs 151 crore to the PM-CARES fund. Party president Sonia Gandhi said the Congress would pay the labourers&rsquo; fares.</p><p>Stung, the BJP said the government was already bearing 85 per cent of the expense of the tickets and had asked states to pay the remaining 15 per cent. This, critics say, is a sleight of hand, more a convoluted calculation based on fewer passengers due to social distancing norms and the ticket subsidies on offer during regular times. The point about fares, and the cavalier treatment of migrant workers, was lost in yet another bare-knuckle political brawl. And then Karnataka decided it didn&rsquo;t want to send migrant workers home, regardless of what the workers themselves might want. Belatedly waking up to the irony of trying to reawaken the state&rsquo;s moribund economy while sending all the workers home, the Karnataka government said its factories needed employees. By restricting freedom of movement and choice, said critics, the workers were being treated like indentured labour.</p><p>Former Rajya Sabha MP and economist Bhalchandra Mungekar says this only shows &ldquo;the utter failure of government policies&rdquo;. &ldquo;When the government knew that 90 per cent of the workers were engaged in the unorganised sector and this sector was being shut down, the first thing they should have done is make arrangements to send them home,&rdquo; he says. Had this been done, he argues, they might have been ready to return to the cities now as states seek to reopen their economies. Mungekar says the challenge today is that at the end of the lockdown, there will be no workers in the factories; the ones who are gone are unlikely to return for at least 2-4 months.</p><p>According to the figures of the ministry of home affairs, over 100,000 migrants have returned home on the special trains since May 1. But the numbers seeking to return are huge, with two million registered in Gujarat, 860,000 in Punjab and 361,190 in Kerala alone.</p><p>This is going to hit hard when business finally tries to pick up. There will be a labour crisis in almost all industrial cities and clusters in the country. Take Wazirabad in Delhi, for instance, where Baweja has his factory. He says a large number of migrants had already left the area following the riots in February. And with the exodus now, by the time the factories start working, just 10 per cent of the labour will be available, he says.</p><p>Construction, alre&shy;ady in limbo, could see another static spell. Small real estate developers, particularly, say they cannot cope with labour shortages and, if some workers do return, with the likely wage increases. Ramesh Sharma, a partner at a Ghaziabad real estate firm, says small firms like his &ldquo;are dependent on contractors for labour&rdquo;. Before the lockdown, he says, &ldquo;labourers were paid Rs 400-500 per day. But now costs will rise. I don&rsquo;t know if we&rsquo;ll even be able to start work when the lockdown is lifted&rdquo;.</p><p>An executive at a Ludhiana-based textile company says his industry is used to labour shortages during harvest season, but &ldquo;not a crisis on this scale&rdquo;. Right now, he adds, &ldquo;factories are not even at half-strength, how can things go straight back to normal once the lockdown is lifted? Expensive labour will be a major problem for industry.&rdquo; There is no two ways about it, the lockdown and unclear government policies have put both lives and livelihoods in peril.</p><p><em><strong>with Ashish Misra and Shubham Shankhdhar</strong></em></p><div id="tab-link-wrapper-plugin"><div class="authors__container"><div class="authors__by"><div class="authlable">Published By: </div><div class="authdetaisl">Iram Ara Ibrahim</div></div><div class="published__on"><div class="authlable">Published On: </div><div class="authdetaisl">May 9, 2020</div></div></div><div class="sendros">--- ENDS ---</div></div>

 Struggling with unemployment and hunger, when the shutdown was extended till May 3, Rakesh cycled 1,100 kilometres to go home.

India Today

The migrant dilemma

The only remaining nuclear treaty between the US and Russia expires today. It effectively spells a death knell for nearly three decades of nuclear control cooperation. What was the treaty? Will it lead to a new nuclear arms race? We delve into these questions in this article.

Russia's Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump

US-Russia nuclear treaty expires today. Will it lead to a new arms race?

Actor Eesha Rebba filed a complaint at the Banjara Hills Police Station to report harassment after receiving obscene and abusive comments on Instagram amid promotional activities for her recent Telugu film.

eesha rebba files complaint

Telugu actor Eesha Rebba files complaint over obscene Instagram comments

The era of vibe coding may be over. AI guru Andrej Karpathy believes that the world will now move to a new way of using AI to write code, what he calls agentic engineering. Here is what it means.

AI guru Andrej Karpathy believes that vibe coding may be over. (Representational image made with AI)

Vibe coding era over? AI guru who coined the term prefers agentic engineering now

Abhijeet Sawant, winner of Indian Idol season 1, has addressed persistent problems in the film music industry relating to singer pay and royalties. His comments follow Arijit Singh's recent announcement to step away from playback singing.

Abhijeet Sawant

No royalties, low pay, fear culture: Abhijeet Sawant on playback singing struggles

Korean pop culture has surged in India since 2022, spanning dramas, music, food, fashion, and language learning. From family-centric storytelling to soft masculinity and female-focused narratives, Korean content has struck a deep emotional chord across age groups, becoming one of the most influential global cultural forces shaping Indian audiences today.

Why Korean culture won India’s heart with K-dramas, K-pop, kimchi

K-dramas, K-pop, kimchi: Why Korean culture won India’s heart

Play Time!

Parliament Budget Session

Bharat Taxi

PM Modi

Donald Trump

Mamata Banerjee

IND vs AFG LIVE Score

Rahul Gandhi

Lok Sabha

WPL 2026

Dhurandhar 2

T20 World Cup

Border 2

Here's the drone visuals of the massive traffic jam on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway, which has hit vehicular movement for over 24 hours after a gas tanker overturned in the hilly Khandala Ghat section.

drone

Watch: Drone visuals of massive 22-km traffic jam on Mumbai-Pune Expressway

Addressing the Lok Sabha, Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said the government has successfully safeguarded sensitive sectors in US trade deal.  

Piyush Goyal: No Compromise On Farmers Interests In US Deal

India protected agriculture, dairy interests in US trade deal: Piyush Goyal

In this Special Report, India Today’s Mir Fareed provides exclusive details on a major counter-terror operation in Jammu and Kashmir’s Udhampur. Security forces, including the Army, Jammu Kashmir Police, and CRPF, successfully eliminated two Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorists who were hiding in a natural cave within a dense forested terrain. Mir Fareed noted, ‘Finally, their luck ran out as security forces used IEDs to blow up the entrance. And with that, they were eliminated.’ One of the deceased has been identified as a top commander, Abu Mavia. The operation involved sophisticated drone surveillance and sharpshooters to pin down the terrorists who had previously evaded capture. The report highlights the evolving tactics of security agencies in tackling infiltrators using the treacherous forest reaches of Jammu. The area is currently being sanitised as per standard operating procedures following the recovery of weapons.

Mir Fareed: Two Jaish Terrorists Killed In Udhampur Cave

2 Jaish terrorists killed as security forces blow up cave in Jammu and Kashmir

This news report covers the intense political confrontation in Parliament where Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi reportedly called BJP leader Ravneet Singh Bittu a 'traitor'. The incident occurred near the Makar Dwar as suspended MPs were protesting. The transcript highlights that Bittu, once a close associate of Gandhi, was heckled by Congress members following the remark. Additionally, the bulletin features a statement regarding the suspension of eight Congress MPs for the remainder of the session due to 'unruly behaviour'. Dilip Saikia, who was in the chair during the ruckus, stated that the members violated parliamentary decorum and rules. The report notes that the Congress party views those who defect to the other side through a specific 'prism', leading to the sharp exchange. The drama unfolded as Priyanka Gandhi also met with the suspended legislators to discuss the adjournment of the House.

Rahul Gandhi Calls Bittu a Traitor in Parliament

Rahul Gandhi Calls Ravneet Singh Bittu a 'Traitor' outside Parliament

On this Special Report, the focus is on a tragic incident in Ghaziabad where three minor sisters, aged 12, 14, and 16, allegedly died by suicide by jumping from the ninth floor of a high-rise building. ACP Atul Kumar stated, 'Three girls jumped from the balcony of the ninth floor of flat number 907 in Bharat City and were declared dead upon arrival at the hospital.' A suicide note recovered from the scene read, 'Mummy Papa, we are sorry.' Police have seized mobile phones and gadgets for forensic examination to determine if specific gaming tasks triggered the extreme step. The incident occurred around 2:30 AM, and authorities are recording statements from family and neighbors to uncover the exact cause behind this triple suicide horror.

Atul Kumar: 3 Sisters Jump To Death In Ghaziabad

Download App

Mood of the Nation Offer: Use promo code MOTN2026 to get ₹500 off on all Print + Digital subscriptions

The migrant dilemma

Struggling with unemployment and hunger, when the shutdown was extended till May 3, Rakesh cycled 1,100 kilometres to go home.

PUBLICATIONS

TELEVISION

EVENTS

RADIO

GAMING

USEFUL LINKS

PRINTING

WELFARE

DISTRIBUTION

SYNDICATIONS

WEBSITES

EDUCATION