Chief minister Hemant Soren has requested Union home minister Amit Shah for permission to fly in Jharkhand’s migrant workers stranded in Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Ladakh and North-Eastern states by chartered planes.

The chief minister’s secretariat on Thursday stated that migrant workers stranded in these places cannot be brought back by any other means of transport such as buses or trains under the present circumstances.

There are about 200 workers stranded in Ladakh and about 450 more in the northeast, the release further said.

Though the number of workers stranded in Andaman and Nicobar Islands was not specified, a bureaucrat who did not come on quote said the figure may be around 400.

CM Hemant Soren pays homage to elder brother and JMM leader Durga Soren on his death anniversary at his residence in Ranchi

A similar request to allow chartered planes to bring back stranded workers from remote locations was also made earlier on May 12, the news release of the CM’s secretariat added.

The news release added that around 1.5 lakh migrant labourers have been brought back to the state after the Centre allowed their interstate movement.

Many of these migrants are back in Jharkhand by special Shramik trains, beginning with one that left Hyderabad on May 1.

One such special train carrying 1,477 workers reached Hatia station in Ranchi on Wednesday evening from Mangalore in Karnataka.

Around 9.5 lakh migrant workers of Jharkhand may be stranded in other states, though their exact number is not known.

Last week on May 8, a special train also brought back patients and their relatives from Vellore in Tamil Nadu to Hatia station in Ranchi.