Keonjhar/Raisaun: Despite the government spending a lot on developing infrastructure in rural areas, many remote villages in Keonjhar district do not have motorable roads.
As a result, people fail to avail healthcare services. Often, cots double up as stretchers to carry patients to hospitals as ambulances fail to reach the villages. Moreover, in the absence of good roads, welfare schemes have failed to benefit the people.
A case in point is Upararaigoda panchayat under Bansapal block. Recently, a pregnant woman of Chhadadihi in the panchayat was carried on a cot for several km before being shifted to an ambulance to take her to the hospital. The patient, Padmini Dehuri, was taken to Bansapal hospital but her condition had deteriorated by the time she reached there. Then she was shifted to the district headquarters hospital.
Similarly, the villagers of Radhuan have been suffering from commuting problems in the absence of a motorable road. A few days ago, a pregnant Juanga woman could not be taken to the hospital immediately and had to wait for hours for an ambulance. Her baby had allegedly died in the womb for the inordinate delay, locals alleged.
Though the government has introduced bike ambulance for remote and far-off places, the service is a flop in such emergency cases, villagers said.
Many villages do not have telephone network. Service of 102 and 108 ambulance has been virtually an impossible proposition for them, they rued.
The villagers said that they have been taking up the issue of commuting woes from the block to the district administration, but nothing is being done to improve road connectivity at Upararaigoda and Radhuan. They pointed out that in rainy season these villages remain cut off from the rest of the world.
Various outfits and social activists have demanded that the district administration take immediate steps for road connectivity to these villages.
PNN