Why Taxi-Aggregators Offer ‘Lockdown Charity’ From ‘Public Donations’ To Few Drivers?

The Billion dollar startups Ola and Uber have helped barely 5 percent of their drivers despite asking users for donations to contribute to their relief funds during the #Covid lockdown crisis. Since several weeks, Uber users have been inundated with push notifications seeking contributions for its drivers; almost all of whom have been out of […]

The ‘Pain And Agony’ Of A Son Who Lost Ailing Mother With #COVID In Hyderabad

It was just after midnight on April 28, when Mohammed got the phone call he was dreading. For the last few days, his entire family was at home in a containment zone in Hyderabad while his mother was at the Gandhi Hospital, where all COVID-19 patients in Telangana undergo treatment. “Doctors treating my mother told […]

No Takers For Modi’s ‘One Nation, One Ration Card’ In Telangana

The much-touted ‘one nation one ration card rolled out by the Centre allowing people from other States to avail ration in any part of the country seems no takers in Telangana. According to the State Civil Supplies department officials, the ‘one nation one ration card is being implemented in Telangana along with several other states […]

Is Hyderabad Heading For An Exit Or For Lockdown 3.0?

Telangana must bite the bullet and end the complete lockdown, instead of focusing on areas where the COVID-19’s prevalence is high. It opted for an extension of the lockdown and the Centre went along with it. Put differently, the Centre extended it and complied. In Telangana, the 30 districts, 12 have below five cases, nine […]

Inside Rohingya Refugee Camps Fears Of Covid Spread And Religious Scapegoating

Indian Home Ministry directive to screen Rohingyas had more to do with suspected Tablighi Jamaat link than concern over their living conditions. Thousands of Rohingya refugees in Hyderabad are at high risk for contracting Covid-19, as they live in cramped habitations and have limited access to public healthcare, activists say. Three weeks after the Centre […]

Poor Hyderabad Residents ‘Without Ration Cards’ Fear ‘Hungry Days’ Ahead

Many people in Hyderabad are started starving due to non-availability of ration and food in remote areas. Several families, residing as migrant workers or poor without ration cards and a section of lower middle class people applied for ration card and not yet received since years are facing hunger during this lockdown period. As a […]

An Ordeal Of ‘Hungry’, Stranded Migrant ‘Construction Workers’ In Hyderabad

Over 2,000 migrants from Srikakulam district work as daily wage labourers in the booming construction industry of Hyderabad narrates the ordeal of sorrow and hunger. No government or public representatives reached yet to feed them properly. “Our bags had already been packed by evening of April 13 in the hope of catching the earliest bus […]

Hyderabad Sex Workers ‘Starving’ In Lockdown Without Income

Hyderabad waits with bated breath for May 7 —the day the extended lockdown is supposed to end. The COVID-19 pandemic, and the subsequent nation-wide lockdown imposed to prevent the spread of the virus, has brought in its wake economic upheaval and financial predicaments. For one of the most marginalized communities, that already lives on the […]

Why Horticulture Department Sacked Outsourced Employees, Despite Strict Govt Instructions In Telangana?

Despite the Telangana government’s strict instructions not to lay off employees, it has sacked over 100 low-grade outsourced employees working in the Horticulture department. Kashamma is in distress. On a regular day, she would wake up at 4 am, cook meals for her three children, leave home by 6 am and reach the residence of […]

Why Migrant Workers Starve In Lockdown As States Sit On Huge Relief Funds Collected?

The extension of India’s national lockdown till May 4 has revived concerns that the country’s migrant workers, many of whom work in the unorganised construction sector, are being pushed to the brink of destitution. A recent survey of more than 3,000 migrant construction workers conducted by Jan Sahas, an NGO, found the lockdown had robbed […]