128 landslide survivors in Nawalparasi continue to spend night in open

(Dayaram Acharya) As many as 128 people from 18 households at Hupsekot rural municipality-5 in Nawalparasi district who were displaced by a landslide in last August have been living under open sky braving the biting cold. They were rescued and relocated to a nearby school at Beluwa in Hupsekot following the disaster. As the school has resumed teaching learning activities in physical presence of students and teachers, the landslide survivors have been further relocated to the site where a bus park is being constructed. Among the displaced ones, three families have been taking refuge in a local school while two other have been staying in office building of Hupsekot rural municipality ward no 1. Likewise, 13 other families have been living in a makeshift tent braving the cold wave and cold wind. Tam Bahadur Rana is living with eight members in the makeshift tent.

He, who owned 6 ropani of land in his village, has no other alternative than staying in a temporary shelter and in bare minimum. “Our house was rendered inhabitable by the landslide; the debris of landslide has broken apart the arable land and created fissures too. It has been increasingly difficult to spend the night in bone-chilling winter,” wailed Rana. Min Bahadur Somai shared that he is worried that his children would be taken ill due to biting cold in the makeshift tent. “When will we get rid of unsafe and unmanaged stay like this under the tent?” Hand-to-mouth problems have also plagued the landslide survivors who were living off by agriculture and husbandry in their village. “We don’t have land here to work. When we seek for job, we don’t get one. We are having problems to run our households,” bemoaned Prem Bahadur Barahghare, 32. Earlier, he was earning a living by goat farming. He sold off all his 50 goats at a throwaway price post landslide. “Here we don’t have open space to run poultry even in a small scale. How to eke out a living here?,” he said sorrily. The landslide survivors have been making a living out of relief packages provided by local government and social organizations which are not enough to go by. However, chief administrator of Hupsekot rural municipality Pawan Aryal shared that a temporary shelter was under-construction at public land close to Shivalaya Community Forest at Jukepani in the district to house the landslide survivors. Although they intended to shift the displaced landslide survivors prior to winter, it had not been yet possible due to various reasons, he admitted.