THE sprawling Madurai Corporation grounds near the Maattuthavani integrated bus terminus have played host to hundreds of migrant families from Warangal district in Andhra Pradesh. An important tourist destination, Madurai is an ideal place for these families to "work". Each one of the group, from newborn to adult, is an `earning' member. They go about begging from dawn to dusk and return to their shelters made of polymer sheets.
While the adults are dressed in normal clothes, the younger ones are decked up in costumes depicting Hanuman or Rama.
They could be found outside the Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple, the Tirumalai Nayak Palace and the Gandhi Museum and at other tourist spots besides at traffic junctions, bus stands and cinema halls. They were never treated as a nuisance.
K. Pazhani, owner of a roadside eatery near the Corporation grounds, said these "nomads" came to Madurai when there was no work back home. They returned to Andhra Pradesh, probably when employment opportunities were available there.
These families also benefited from the compassion of the Corporation authorities, who not only allowed them to pitch their tents on its grounds but also provided them with drinking water in tanker lorries once in three days. The Corporation also repaired a hand pump meant for drawing groundwater. The babies of the beggar colony were administered polio drops and other preventive medicines.
At present, the Corporation grounds wear a deserted look. The migrant families left for their home towns in January. What awaits them when they return is the court order banning begging.
S. Mohamed Imranullah
