The Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Centre and the governments of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana to provide free rations to migrant workers stranded in the National Capital Region without insisting on identity proof, and arrange transport for those migrants who want to return home.

The bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and M.R. Shah said these governments must also open community kitchens and serve two free meals a day to the migrant workers and their families.

The directives came on an application from a group of social activists that sought to avert a rerun of the misery that migrant workers stranded by the first wave of Covid had to endure last year.

Harsh Mander, Anjali Bharadwaj and Jagdeep Chhokar have said in the petition, filed jointly through advocates Prashant Bhushan and Cheryl D’Souza, that an estimated 8 crore migrant workers are facing severe hardship because of the second wave of Covid.

The apex court passed these directions:

⚫ The Centre and the governments of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana must provide dry rations to migrant workers stranded in the National Capital Region (NCR) with immediate effect.

⚫ The authorities must not insist on identity cards but provide the dry rations on the basis of self-declarations from the migrants.

⚫ The governments of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana must ensure (within their districts that fall within the NCR) adequate transport for stranded migrants who want to return to their home states.

⚫ The district administrations may in coordination with police identify the stranded migrant labourers and facilitate their transport by road or train.

⚫ The Centre may instruct the railway ministry to take care of the migrants’ transport.

⚫ The governments of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana must open community kitchens at well-advertised places (in the NCR) so that stranded migrant labourers and their families get two free meals a day.

The bench asked the Centre, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana to respond to the application and state how they would assuage the stranded migrant labourers’ misery.

It also issued notices on the application to the Maharashtra, Gujarat and Bihar governments “to file their reply giving the details of the measures which they propose to take to ameliorate the miseries of migrant workers regarding transportation... and providing dry ration(s) as well as cooked meals....”

The apex court noted that several states had, despite directions issued last year, not yet filed replies stating the steps they had taken to mitigate the hardships of migrant workers stranded within their borders.

It therefore issued fresh directions giving, “as a last chance”, 10 days to Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Bihar, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Odisha to file responses on the steps taken or about to be taken, along with the timetable.

The next hearing is on May 24.