Click to play videoChandigarh: River Kosi's water levels are receding across BIhar by one to two feet. But for the thousands who have been left homeless by the river's onslaught, life is still a struggle.
After leaving their jobs and returning home, Bihar's labourers are making their way back to other states, such as Punjab, to find a way to feed their stranded families.
Three months ago, the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) had encouraged Bihari labourers in Punjab to return to their home state leading to a shortage of workers in Punjab.
However, nature's fury in Bihar is again propelling workers who have lost all they owned to return to Punjab in search of work.
Biswa Kumar and his family are on their way to Punjab. They are among hundreds of labourers from Bihar who have fled to the state in search of a livelihood.
Punjab's economy is heavily dependent on migrant workers, but the introduction of the NREGS had triggered a mass migration of labourers back to their home states. However, now the labourers from Bihar are back.
A migrant worker, Jugal Kishore says, "We have lost everything back home and have now come to find work and make some money in Punjab."
Many Punjabi farmers, grappling with high labour costs are happy with this reverse migration.
A famer, Devinder Singh says, "We are glad they they are coming here as our work is getting done. But we are also sad that there are floods in Bihar."
Labourers like Biswa Kumar believe jobs in Punjab can help them rebuild their lives and send a little money home to loved ones back home in flood hit-Bihar.
Meanwhile, it seems as if the economic prosperity of the people of Bihar and Punjab are intertwined.
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