Three years ago a cloudburst followed by flash floods created havoc in Leh and other parts including Nobra Valley, Chuglamsar etc. It not only claimed 257 human lives including 25 foreign tourists but also damaged 1447 residential houses. Out of them 664 houses were damaged fully while 783 were damaged partially. Union Home Minister, State Chief Minister and even the Prime Minister paid a visit to the devastated sites and expressed all help to the sufferers. But the ground situation three years later is that no headway has been made in rebuilding the damaged infrastructure and people are left to fend for themselves. Under Prime Minister’s Relief Fund an amount of Rs 125 crore was sanctioned for payment as ex-gratia relief to the next of kin of those who died and also to those whose houses met with damages. This amount also included expenditures to be incurred on rebuilding the canals irrigating the agrarian tracts of land. All this has yet to see the light of the day. No damaged canal in any of the three areas has been reconstructed.
However Government sources claim that work of relief and construction of canals etc. has been partially carried out with the help of funds received from the Government of India. The fact is that though work was started on some nallahs but major nallahs which were main source of irrigating the agriculture land including Leh nallah, Stakno nallah, Domkhar nallah and Indus nallah have not been touched. Besides, there are other small nallahs on which work has not been started.
Though officials claim that relief work has been taken in hand, the fact is that it is so slow and tardy that it loses its impact. Three years is a long time to bring relief to the sufferers. The farmers are not able to cultivate their agricultural lands because the water supply has been disrupted and canals are not rebuilt. True that there are limited days of work owing to long harsh winter in Ladakh region. But it should have been a matter of priority with the administration to bring most of their relief works to completion during the summer months.
We strongly feel that justice is not done to the flash flood sufferers of Ladakh and the speed with which relief work should have been done is lacking. This is unacceptable. It gives rise to complaints of discrimination. It is the duty of the Government to bring all relief works to completion within next two to three months of summer in Ladakh failing which peoples’ suffering will have no end.
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