Construction activity comes back alive
KYT team
Thane: Amid the coronavirus crisis, the economy is slowly moving back to track and so is the construction business in the city. Months back exodus of migrants mostly from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Jharkhand among many left the city and livelihood due to looming scare of the disease.
Roughly 11 lakhs of migrants left the city during the pandemic who were working across different sectors and the construction industry has been worse affected.
To ensure that the construction activity resumes smoothly and projects are completed in due time, the developers are wooing the migrant workers with better in house and stay facility and bearing the transportation charges.
Rajan Bandelkar, MD Raunak group, Thane said, “Work is slowly back to track and we did finance air tickets for the workers to fly down to work. While many came by air, others choose to take up trains and buses.”
“It’s not that they are only wooed back but their safety is our prime concern, while all the necessary tests including corona have been done, daily thermal scanning, social distancing, and sanitization is being taken care of,” said Bandelkar.
With safety being the prime concern there are other developers who are giving better living facilities to the construction workers who are back to work. The migrant workers mostly reside in the makeshift home or chawl near the construction site. The norms have now changed and a hygienic arrangement is being done for them.
“While we have reimbursed the expenses towards transportation, we have made it a point to be vigilant about their safety. Social distancing is followed and we encourage them to report about any health issues and ensure timely medical help,” said a developer from Thane.
Covid has definitely changed the way we live and work and people are slowly adapting to the new normal.
Ajit Singh, a migrant worker from Bihar said, “ We wanted to come back to the city of dreams as it gave us food money. I am happy to be back here. Mask, daily sanitization, and thermal screening is something new that is happening but now we are no more scared of the disease.”
“We take all precautionary measures, with better the facility we also ensure to the infection at bay,” said Singh.
Like Singh many others too have returned to the city and have adapted the new normal and are happy to be back in the city again.
The Raheja group of developers too have considered the safety points and have ensured better sanitation and homestay for the migrant workers.
The developers feel that while much of the work has resumed and many laborers are back in the city, things will be back to normal in coming few months.