Legal team to the aid of African students in Bhopal

BHOPAL: The District Legal Service Aid (DLSA) of Bhopal has come to the rescue of a few students of African countries who are stuck in Bhopal and facing problems during the lockdown. The students were facing financial problems and had no food or groceries with them.
"A few African students enrolled in Barkatullah University and other colleges of Bhopal could not go back home before the lockdown and were managing with what little supplies they had.They come from countries like Zimbabwe, Uganda, Burundi and Zambia. Initially, they did what they could, but the landlords housing them started pestering them either for rent and or to leave the apartment. It was a difficult situation as they are college students and have nowhere else to go during this time. They reached out to us for help to sort out the matter," said additional district judge, Ashutosh Mishra.
The staff of the DLSA intervened and counselled the landlords who gave the rooms on rent to the African students in Katara Hills and asked them to waive off the rent for the lockdown period or charge it later. "These are students and are barely managing their basic expenses, how will they pay rent? Their parents are in lockdown in their hometowns and are not able to send them money. It's not fair to pressure them to pay rent," Mishra said.
Julius Max, an MBA student, told TOI that he along with 20 other students from Africa were stuck in Bhopal and were unable to get money from their parents and ran out of groceries during the lockdown.
"We did not want to wander outside to get food as we didn't want to break the rules of India. So I browsed the internet and found the number of Justice Mishra. He helped us out and told our landlord to take the rent later. He also got us food like bread and butter, flour, rice, potatoes, cooking oil and other things that we asked for," said Max.