Double whammy for flood victims

For families of those killed in last year’s devastating flash floods in Uttarakhand, it’s a double whammy.First, many of them were not even able to trace the bodies of their near and dear ones, swept away by the killer floods in the Himalayan state in June last year.And now, eight months later, they have to face a cumbersome process to get compensation as promised by the government, thanks to bureaucratic red-tapism.

Updated on: Feb 26, 2014, 14:38:51 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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For families of those killed in last year’s devastating flash floods in Uttarakhand, it’s a double whammy.
First, many of them were not even able to trace the bodies of their near and dear ones, swept away by the killer floods in the Himalayan state in June last year.
And now, eight months later, they have to face a cumbersome process to get compensation as promised by the government, thanks to bureaucratic
red-tapism.
On June 16 and 17 last year, the flash floods had devastated the fabled Kedarnath valley, sweeping away village after village and leaving over 4000 dead or

missing (persons whose bodies have not been recovered are presumed dead but still officially listed as missing).
Around 237 persons from Delhi were said to have died in the tragedy and bodies of most of them were swept away by the swirling waters, resulting from a cloud

burst in the upper reaches of Uttarakhand.
After the mandatory 90 days, the Uttarakhand government notified a list of 143 persons as untraceable and issued death certificates to them by November 2013.
Immediately after the list was notified, the Uttarakhand government also transferred `5.50 crore to be paid as compensation to the families of those who were

killed or went missing.
The responsibility of disbursing the money was given to the Delhi government.
On its part, the Delhi government issued detailed guidelines for verification of the persons, whose death certificates were issued by the Uttarakhand government,

before releasing the money.
It notified the sub-divisional officers (tehsildars) for verification of the claims and ensuring proper documentation before release of the money.
According to the guidelines, the officer will have to ensure that the first information report (FIR) about the missing person was filed before June 30, 2013. Also

the claims made by the person have to be verified with the database maintained by the district disaster management authority..
Also, if the FIR had been filed beyond this the time limit (June 30), the reasons for approaching the police late should be inquired.
The officer was also asked to inquire whether the victim had traveled to Uttarakhand and the person was missing since he or she left for the Himalayan state.
The directives were issued to the officers by the Delhi government in January, after Arvind Kejriwal took over as Delhi chief minister.
“Despite the guidelines and issuance of death certificates by the Uttarakhand government, most of the families have not received any money from the

government. We raised the issue when our party was in the government. But it did not had any impact on the bureaucracy,” said Rajesh Garg, an Aam Aadmi

Party (AAP) legislator.
Some family-members of the victims have been running from pillar to post to get the compensation.
“My father was the only bread-earner of the family. The compensation will help me to set up a small business to provide livelihood for my family,” said Rajesh

Pandey, whose father was one of the persons who has been confirmed as missing by the Uttarakhand government.
The family-members have objected to the Delhi government’s cumbersome verification process saying that the Uttarakhand government has already provided

photographs of the victims after conducting necessary verification.
“I don’t understand why the government wants us to undergo the painful and tedious process again,” a person, not willing to be quoted and have lost his mother

in the tragedy, said.
A Delhi government official, however, said that directions have been issued to speed up the verification process and disburse compensation as quickly as

possible.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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