Since the Prime Minister's announcement of the national lockdown on Tuesday, March 24, the whole of the country is under strict travel restrictions and surveillance is enforced by the police force to ensure that no human remains on the streets except under unavoidable situations.
India can only curb the spread of the novel coronavirus with these measures.
A heart-wrenching tale
Amid these travel restrictions, in a heart-breaking instance reported a 26-year-old daily wager walked over 135 km without food from Nagpur in Maharashtra. He walked all this way hunger-stricken to reach his home in Chandrapur.
Narendra Shelke, who worked as a labourer in Pune was on his way back home in Jambh village in Saoli tehsil of Chandrapur district after the PM's notice on the national lockdown extending for the next 21 days.
As panic built up over the lockdown, most of the migrant labor workers like Shelke started returning to their homelands.
The police force become the saviours
He had managed to catch the last train from Pune to Nagpur, but as the government later enforced restrictions on all sorts of travel, he got stranded in Nagpur.
Having lost with no way to find assistance, Shelke started a foot march on the Nagpur-Nagbhid road on Tuesday to reach his village in Chandrapur. The young man thus walked for two days without food and survived only on water.
To his luck, it was on Wednesday night that a police patrolling team spotted an exhausted Shelke at Shivaji square in Sindewahi tehsil, located around 135 km from Nagpur. The police initially took him for violating the lockdown rules but soon found the unfortunate condition.
Shelke narrated his ordeal and told them that he was walking since the last two days to reach his home, said Sindewahi police station's assistant inspector Nishikant Ramteke.
Hospitalised for further care
Shelke was immediately taken to a rural hospital in Sindewahi. After his medical checkup was done, a police sub-inspector brought a dinner box from his house for Shelke.
Later, after getting confirmation nod from the duty doctors at the hospital, the police arranged a vehicle to take the man to Jambh village, located around 25 km from Sindewahi, Ramteke said.
Although walked on foot all alone, Shelke has been home-quarantined for 14 days as a precautionary measure, the official added.
