Return to West Bengal, MP urges migrant labourers

Kolkata, July 29: Trinamool Congress MP from Jhargram constituency, Dr Uma Soren appealed to all labourers, who have left West Bengal in search of work, to come back to the state as it has made "arrangements" for their return.

"The state government has made all the arrangements.

There will be no dearth of rice and clothes," Soren said, while visiting the Uporkatmundi village in Jhargram, where Benu Singh, the mother of the three girls, who died allegedly due to starvation in east Delhi, used to reside before marriage.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's had last year promised support and opportunities for migrant labourers from the state, if they felt unsafe in other states and wanted to come back.

Soren spoke to her brothers and relatives and assured them the the state will be by their side in their hour of crisis.

Benu's brothers requested the MP to make necessary arrangements to bring their sister back to the village, located under the jurisdiction of Sankrail police station in the Jhargram district, officials said.

All help and support will be given to the family, Soren said.

Mangal Singh, the father of the girls, is untraceable since Tuesday, when they were declared dead by doctors of a Delhi hospital.

A day after a preliminary magisterial probe report sought a "deeper investigation" into the conduct of Mangal, a police team was today sent to his native place in West Bengal to trace him, a senior officer said.

A magisterial probe report had said he had given some "unknown medicine" to his daughters by "mixing it in hot water" on the night of July 23, and went missing since the morning of July 24.

Police said they were awaiting the viscera report, which would help determine whether the girls were given any medicine that could have led to their death.

The initial autopsy reports had suggested that they died due to starvation. A medical board at the Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital had conducted a second autopsy at the request of police, which had corroborated the first post-mortem report.