The Supreme Court has stayed the order of the Odisha High Court, which on Thursday said that only those migrants who had tested negative for coronavirus must be allowed into the state. In the wake of High Court's order, the state government was prompted to annul the permission it had previously given to other states to send back the eastern state's migrant workers on trains.
"State government should ensure that all the migrants who are in queue to come to Odisha should be tested negative of COVID-19 before boarding the conveyance," a High Court bench comprising Justices S Panda and KR Mohapatra had ordered on Thursday.
On Friday in the apex court, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and Advocate Kanu Agarwal contended that the Ministry of Home Affairs had already allowed the migrants with no symptoms to return, given they were quarantined in their native state.
The Odisha government has been expecting some five lakh migrant workers from other states to make the homebound journey.
The state authorities have noted with concern that 17 persons in the Ganjam district, who had recently returned from Gujarat's Surat, tested positive for the virus. According to reports, nearly three lakh people from Ganjam have been working in the diamond industry of Surat.
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