By <keyword id="1248857" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Prashant-Rangnekar">Prashant Rangnekar</keyword> New Delhi, Apr 15 () Their families wait back home, anxious and fearful, but maybe the harvest won't, pushing them deeper into a vicious cycle of debt there will be no getting out of, they say. With three weeks gone and maybe another three to go before they can even contemplate returning to their villages, the days ahead stretch interminably for the thousands of migrant labourers who decided to not take the long walk home but wait for the lockdown to end. And now, with the lockdown extended till May 3 to stem the spread of the coronavirus, the little money they had is mostly gone and so is hope it will end anytime soon. Anil Yadav, a daily wager with the parcel department of the railways who was ready to rush back to his village in Maharajganj in Uttar Pradesh to harvest wheat, is still stunned by Prime Minister <keyword id="6354477" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Narendra-Modi">Narendra Modi</keyword>'s announcement on Tuesday extending the pan India shutdown by 19 days. "I have already lost the entire sugarcane crop sown in my one-acre land. It could have brought my family some money. But I can't go back and no one can harvest the crop," said the 28-year-old. "My wife, two children (aged one and three) and old parents have no support. They can't step out even to buy necessary items. They don't have money and now I am stuck here," he said. Sitting under a tree in the complex, dispiritedly eating his 'dal-rice' lunch, Yadav added that his family is staring at a huge financial crisis and plead with him everyday to return home. "But how can I?" he asked. He earned Rs 7,000-8,000 a month in his job but the money and the job have both gone. With all of India under lockdown, there are no train or inter-state bus services. Yadav is one of the 330 people, including the homeless and migrants, staying at the <keyword id="187727" type="LOCATION" weightage="20" keywordseo="Yamuna-Sports-Complex">Yamuna Sports Complex</keyword> camp that has been turned into a shelter home by the Delhi government. On April 1, a week after the first phase of the lockdown came into effect, Yadav was one of the many thousands who went to the <keyword id="75794" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Anand-Vihar">Anand Vihar</keyword> Interstate Bus Terminal hoping to manage a seat. Instead, he was packed into a bus by police and sent to the Yamuna Sports Complex. Asha Devi, a mother of four, tries hard to fight back her tears as she talks about her two sons, one 14 and the other only six, alone at their village in Uttar Pradesh's <keyword id="514433" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Banda-district">Banda district</keyword>. "My two sons are all alone at home. The older one works as a daily wage labourer and looks after his younger brother. I am so scared," the 36-year-old said. Sitting next to her is a group of 13 daily labourers, including her husband and her extended family members, from Uttar Pradesh's Banda district. The group left their homes early last month to work in a brick kiln in rural Ghaziabad After the lockdown, which came into effect after Modi's announcement on March 24, the contractor who hired them assured them of rations but suddenly disappeared leaving them with no money or food. With no option left, the group walked miles to reach Anand Vihar, only to be herded by the police to the Yamuna Sports Complex. She was forced to step out of the village with her 11-year-old daughter who helped her in the brick kiln. The eldest, also a girl, is married. "I want to go back home. If we have to die, we will do that together," she said. She, like the others, was pinning her hopes on the lockdown ending on Wednesday. Yadav and Asha Devi echo the woes of tens of thousands of stranded migrant workers across the country, including in Mumbai where large crowds came out in Bandra on Tuesday clamouring to return to their villages. Many complain there is no one to harvest their standing crop. Some said their families are being pushed to the brink with no money. With their jobs gone, the crops could help them sustain themselves. However, losing the crop would mean certain starvation. Gopesh Kumar, who works as a daily wager in farms in Haryana for Rs 400 a day, said he started working in a farm in Rohtak from March 15. When the lockdown began, the contractor he was working for suddenly asked him to go back. Kumar, who belongs to Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh and is spending his days like the others at the Yamuna Sports Complex shelter, said time is running out. "I can't earn till the lockdown ends. My family does not have money back home. Our entire standing crop of wheat has to be harvested. Who will do that?" he said. "There would have been some relief if the lockdown was lifted. At least, I could have gone back home. But with the extension, I have to wait here for another two weeks," he said, not quite sure of his age. Raju Kushwaha, 38, from Hathras in Uttar Pradesh, has the same question. "How will my family, including three sons, survive if we can't harvest the crop. And if I am not there, who will do it?" The Delhi government is feeding an estimated 7,00,000 people a day in its various camps. These include migrant labourers, beggars and other homeless people. See also: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/data-of-coronavirus-patients-state-wise-in-india/articleshow/74669748.cms">Coronavirus cases in India state wise</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/health/news/coronavirus-myths-and-facts-here-are-some-rumours-about-covid-19-that-arent-true/articleshow/74487962.cms">Coronavirus myths and facts</a>

Lockdown 2.0: Money and jobs gone, stranded migrants desperate to return home

By Prashant Rangnekar New Delhi, Apr 6 () The training of Gaganyaan's four prospective astronauts in Russia has been put on hold as the facility where the exercise is being undertaken has been temporarily shut in the wake of coronavirus outbreak, sources said on Monday. The four test pilots of the Indian Air Force, chosen for India's manned mission to space, have been undergoing training at the Yu.A. Gagarin Research and Test Cosmonaut Training Centre near Moscow since February. However, since last week the centre has been shut due to coronavirus outbreak, sources said. "Our (prospective) astronauts are fine. They are currently in hostel. We have been told the centre will open by the end of the month," a source said. When asked whether the suspension of training for nearly four weeks will hurt the training programme, the sources added that although the training programme spans over 12 months, they had kept a buffer of three months to factor in exigencies. India's first manned mission to space -- Gaganyaan -- is planned around 2022. PR RTRT

Training of Gaganyaan astronauts in Russia put on hold due to lockdown: Sources

By Prashant Rangnekar(Eds: SPECIAL) New Delhi, May 7 () Amidst concerns that coronavirus have undergone mutation and the new strain maybe more contagious, India's premier R&amp;D organisation, CSIR, has submitted as many as 53 genome sequences of the virus to a global genome database, a move that may help in better understanding of the virus and developing a vaccine.The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is also planning to submit additional 450 genome sequence data of coronavirus by May 15, its Director General Shekhar Mande told .CSIR's Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB), Delhi, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad and Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh are currently sequencing the genomes of the novel coronavirus, he said. Other CSIR institutes are also expected to join the process."We have so far submitted 53 genome sequences to the GISAID (Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data). By May 15, we intend to submit additional 450 genome sequences," Mande said, adding all 53 have been sequenced by the scientists at the IGIB.Genome sequencing is figuring out the order of DNA nucleotides. It helps in understanding how genes work together to direct the growth, development and maintenance of an organism.IGIB Director Anurag Agarwal said in case of coronavirus, sequencing will help understand the origins of the virus.For instance, if a virus emerges from a particular cluster, sequencing will make it easier to identify its origin later when it is found in some other part of the country or world. Plus, it will be helpful in making the vaccines and drugs for it, he added.Earlier this week, a study by a US-based science laboratory has indicated that there is a new, highly-potent strain of coronavirus that has spread globally and is more contagious than the virus in early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.In the Indian context, Mande said the sequences submitted to the GISAID by the CSIR deals with the coronavirus detected in Indians.Launched in 2008, the GISAID, a public–private partnership between the German government and the nonprofit organization, promotes the rapid sharing of data from all influenza viruses and the coronavirus causing COVID-19.This includes genetic sequence and related clinical and epidemiological data associated with human viruses, and geographical as well as species-specific data linked to avian and other animal viruses.This enables researchers to understand how viruses evolve and spread during epidemics and pandemics.According to GISAD, more than 16,000 genome sequences of the coronavirus have been shared with it by different institutes in the world which will enable rapid progress in the understanding of the new COVID-19 disease and in the research and development of medical countermeasures."Genomic resources obtained from this sequencing will also allow identification of new targets for diagnosis and drugs for COVID-19," Sanjeev Khosla, Director, IMTech had said when the process had begun.Besides, CSIR, the National Institute of Virology, Pune under the Indian Council of Medical Research and Gujarat Biotechnology Research Centre, a state sponsored institute, have also submitted genome sequences of coronavirus to the GISAID database. But the number of sequences submitted by CSIR is high.The CSIR, a body under the Ministry of Science and Technology, has 38 laboratories dealing with a range of subjects. Globally, more than 38 lakh people have been infected by coronavirus, and over 2.6 lakh people have died due to COVID-19, according to the World Health Organisation database. PR PYKPYK

COVID-19: CSIR submits 53 genome sequences of coronavirus in Indians to global body; To submit 450 more by May 15

By Prashant Rangnekar New Delhi, Apr 4 () There was panic in the air with talk of a pandemic, his job was probably gone as was the roof over his head, but Mukesh Maurya did not let his spirits flag as he set off from Delhi for his village, more than 600 kilometres away, determined to be home to see his baby being born. There were no trains and few buses to get to Musafirkhana in Uttar Pradesh's Amethi district all the way from Rajouri Garden where he worked as a daily wage labourer, but get there he did. It was March 28, Saturday, when he set off for home, 650 km away. The nationwide lockdown to curtail the spread of COVID-19 had begun after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's March 24 announcement and all roads to home it seemed were blocked. But where there is a will there is a way, and 22-year-old Maurya, who reached home on Sunday evening, found it.It took many hours of walking, several more hours of waiting and three gruelling, very crowded bus rides, with social distancing a random, distant thought."I reached just in time. My wife was having labour pains when I reached our village and we had to quickly arrange for an ambulance to take her to hospital," Maurya, now a proud father of a baby boy, told over the phone. "I could manage to be there with my wife when my son was born," he added, the three days of stress and the arduous journey home seemingly already a distant memory.The young man, who earned about Rs 8,000 a month as a daily wage labourer in Rajouri Garden on west Delhi erecting tents and 'pandals' for weddings and other events, said he waited for three days from Wednesday to Friday for the situation to improve and to find some way to leave.When it didn't, he just packed his belongings in a backpack and started walking, joining the exodus of many thousands of migrant workers trekking back to their homes with no food, no jobs and no savings. Several hours into the walk, he said, they were told the Uttar Pradesh government would run bus services on Saturday from Anand Vihar in east Delhi to ferry stranded migrant workers. Notwithstanding the threat of coronavirus infection, he joined the throng of workers to find a spot in the bus on Saturday night. In what was the beginning of 20 hours of bus rides, with the passengers packed in like sardines, the Uttar Pradesh Road Transport Corporation (UPSRTC) bus first took him to Sitapur. There, he waited for five hours for another bus to Lucknow. From Lucknow, he took a private bus to his village in Musafirkhana. It was expensive, costing him Rs 1,200, but worth every rupee, he said. He finally managed to reach his village on Sunday evening. Hours later, on Monday morning at around 11 am, his wife delivered a baby boy, who he said is yet to be named.Maurya, who has been working in Delhi for more than a decade, ever since he was a little boy, is safe with his family, which also includes his parents, three brothers who work as labourers in brick kilns and a younger sister. Life is difficult. His parents till their two 'bighas' (roughly an acre) of land and also work as labourers in neighbouring fields. The challenges are many, he said. After the lockdown, he was told by his contractor there would be no work for at least the next few days and maybe longer. He was also receiving frantic phone calls from his family, their worries compounded by the coronavirus outbreak in the national capital."There was so much stress. I had no work and I was getting constant calls from home to come back. Initially, there was no transport, so I decided to walk down like others. Then on Saturday, channels started flashing the news that the Uttar Pradesh government had started the bus services from Anand Vihar, making the journey easier," he said. The stresses are over – but only for the moment. His wife is in hospital with the baby while he is under lockdown at home. But that's a small worry. It's the bigger questions that haunt– he has to start earning a living again and get back to Delhi but doesn't know how or when.Asked when he would come back to the national capital, he replied, "As soon as this (coronavirus) crisis ends. But when will that be?" A question to which nobody has an answer. PR MIN MINMIN

600 km to home - daily wager reaches home just in time to see his baby's birth

By Prashant Rangnekar New Delhi, May 2 () When death is an everyday business, it takes on the ordinariness of just another job but COVID-19 has changed that equation and those working in crematoriums and graveyards say they are now compelled to confront their own mortality.They thought they were inured to death, even the most tragic ones, but the job itself is edged with apprehension these days, said Pappu, who works at the Nigambodh crematorium.The 39-year-old, who has been helping cremate bodies for 12 years, said he ran away when the first coronavirus patient was brought to him on March 13. In the weeks since, he has overcome his fear but only to some extent.In his years of work at the city's busiest crematorium, Pappu said he has disposed of countless bodies, some of those gravely ill, but never did he fear the dead. The situation has dramatically changed after the pandemic and he is learning to live with all the precautions everyone, and he and his colleagues particularly, must take to ensure they don't get infected. "There is a risk in everything. But this is our job and we have to do it," Pappu, who goes by just one name, told while sanitising the CNG crematorium block after a COVID-19 patient was cremated.Pappu, who lives in Ghaziabad and has a son and two daughters, does not step inside the small block that houses the CNG crematorium units without wearing a PPE kit if there is a coronavirus body that has come for cremation.It has become much better. In the early days of the pandemic, there was very little information and no set guidelines, and people were therefore more scared, he said. According to the guidelines on disposal of bodies by the Health Ministry, the crematorium, burial ground staff should be sensitised and take care that COVID-19 does not pose any additional risk to them."The staff will practice standard precautions of hand hygiene, use of masks and gloves," the guidelines state. Pappu's co-worker Harinder Prasad said he would earlier pick the body and keep it on on the rails that would take it inside the CNG incinerator.But no more, he said, citing the risk of infection."Now, no one even opens the protective sheet wrapped around the body. It is directly placed inside the incinerator," said the 36-year-old as he goes about his daily work.Scenes of death always present a surreal picture. And more so these days.Outside the CNG crematorium block, the staff from two hospitals with bodies of coronavirus patients are wearing PPE kits. Pappu and Prasad, who work with masks and gloves, put on the PPE robes whenever they come in contact with a body.Doctors, paramedical staff are hailed as "corona warriors". Pappu and Prasad are also part of the band of men and women who face the risk of infection but keep at their jobs – because it is an essential service. "If we don't do this then who will. Someone has to do this job," said Prasad in a matter of fact tone.Asked about the fear of dealing with the bodies of coronavirus patients, Prasad said, "Of course, there is a risk of infection. But I fear living humans more than the dead. They are not going to get up and harm us if we take proper precautions."A resident of Bawana, Prasad said he takes a bath twice. Once while leaving the crematorium and then after reaching home.Pradeep, the supervisor of the CNG crematorium, agreed with Pappu and Prasad."We have to keep doing our work. If we take proper precautions, I don't think there is anything to worry about," said Pradeep, who also goes by his first name.Pradeep said patients who have died of COVID-19 are cremated in the CNG incinerator rather than placed on an open pyre in accordance with government guidelines. Not far from Nigambodh Ghat is the Jadid Qabrastan Ahle Islam in ITO, one of the designated graveyards to bury Muslims who have died of the disease. Mohammad Shamim, the caretaker, said 54 bodies related to the coronavirus have been buried in the 50-acre graveyard since the outbreak.According to Shamim, even those who are not coronavirus positive but have shown COVID-19 symptoms are buried according to government guidelines.Shamim, a third-generation care-taker of the graveyard, said the risk of infection is always there but the job has to be done.Several precautions have been taken at the graveyard. There is a separate entry and exit for those 'coronavirus bodies' and a corner earmarked for burial. "There are usually four people who are involved in digging, helping place the body in the grave, and then cover it with earth. But for coronavirus cases, we don't ask out men to touch the bodies. Two family members and two people from the hospital with PPE kits do that."Even the digging takes place with the help of the JCB, Unlike the normal cases where we dig a three-feet grave, in case of coronavirus, we dig a 10-feet pit," he says, pointing out to the graves marked with numbers.Still, he said, overlooking the entire process is a risky affair. "We keep sanitising ourselves and change our gloves at regular intervals." Delhi reported 3,738 coronavirus cases and 61 fatalities till Saturday, according to the Union Health Ministry figures. PR MINMIN

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Lockdown 2.0: Money and jobs gone, stranded migrants desperate to return home

PTI

Training of Gaganyaan astronauts in Russia put on hold due to lockdown: Sources

PTI

COVID-19: CSIR submits 53 genome sequences of coronavirus in Indians to global body; To submit 450 more by May 15

PTI

600 km to home - daily wager reaches home just in time to see his baby's birth

PTI

Intimations of mortality: Graveyard, crematorium workers say job now edged with 'COVID fear'

PTI