Until late March, Ashish Kumar was helping to make plastic boxes for Ferrero Rocher praline chocolates and the plastic spoons tucked inside Kinder ...
Ashish Kumar, 20, who used to work at a plastics factory in western India, poses outside a primary school where he studied in Dutta Nagar village in Gonda district in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, India, Jul 10, 2020. DUTTA NAGAR, India: Until late March, Ashish Kumar was helping to make plastic boxes for Ferrero Rocher praline chocolates and the plastic spoons tucked inside Kinder Joy eggs to scoop out the milky sweet cream inside.
In the COVID-19 pandemic, India's economy is forecast to shrink by 4.5 per cent this year, according to the International Monetary Fund. At least 400 million Indian workers are at risk of falling deeper into poverty, according to the International Labour Organization .Kumar is one of around 131,000 people whom local officials estimate returned from working around India to Gonda, the district in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh that he left last June.
"No matter what," he said, sitting near his parent's single-storey home, surrounded by jade green paddy fields."I need a job."A chance conversation with a cousin who had studied plastic engineering got him hooked, Kumar said, and he started researching. In Dutta Nagar, where there were no Internet connections, that often meant asking one of a handful of locals with a smartphone to Google the opportunities.
The factory that employed him is run by Dream Plast India, a subsidiary of Gruppo Sunino, an Italian plastics maker with 10 plants around the world. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government announced a 20 trillion rupee package promising free rice, wheat and pulses for millions of people and a programme to provide employment in rural areas.
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