Uttarakhand: Without roads and ration, hundreds cut off

Mangalore Today/DHNS

Gautam Dheer, Dehradun, June 22:  As the deluge in hill state Uttrakhand leaves behind a trail of colossal destruction, over a hundred far-flung villages in the state stare at an imminent crisis, lying completely cut off from the rest of the world for the last 11 days without any linkage or access to everyday food, provisions or medical aid.

 

The priority for now, be it for the Army or state government, is on rescue and evacuation of stranded pilgrims, but little forethought has gone into proactively working out a plan to address the looming crisis in these villages. Without roads and ration, natives of these villages are crying for help. Forget fresh supplies, thousands of people in these cut off villages are not only running out of patience but also their own household stock.

The rampaging floods washed away an estimated over 750 roads and highways in the state leaving hundreds of villages to sustain all by themselves, or perhaps, on divine patronage. The crisis has now entered the twelfth day of the devastation, that is estimated to cost a whopping Rs 3,000 crore as per preliminary estimates penned down by the chief minister in an official communiqué to the prime minister. At least 65 villages in the Gangotri region alone have no connectivity with the rest of the places. The villages along the Kadarnath road links too suffer from the same fate.

Major portions of the highway between Uttarkashi and Gangotri have been completely damaged, at places there’s no road for more than a mile, said sources. These native villages have no access to even any medical facility. Availability of medicines is out of the question. Local MLAs are pressing the government to focus on such areas simultaneously.

Worst still, there are over 500 villages in the state which have been spending days and night in darkness. Power supply to these areas is yet to be restored even after so many days. The Kedarnath area is completely without power and there are close to 800 villages in Tehri and Rudraprag that have not seen electricity supply for 12 days now.