Parajang: The villagers of a Dalit basti in this block in Dhenkanal district are living in knee-deep water. The walls of their houses are soaked. Roads are submerged. They wade through stagnant water to come to the market and hospital.
The villagers have been made to live in this wretched condition for two years as the administration ignores their pleas.
The Dalit basti came up by the side of the Rural Development Department’s road that goes to Panibhandar village. Over 50 members of nine families are living here.
During the rainy season, water remains stagnant through the entire season as it has no way to get released. The threat of electrocution also looms large due to the position of the electric transformer.
The problem started two years ago. “We never had the experience of rain water stagnating for a long period earlier. The road had a drainage facility at both ends. The runoff used to pass through hume pipes. The problem started after one end of the road was closed by a villager and the other end by a contractor who constructed a side wall during road construction,” the villagers said.
While there are always fears of snakebites we are suffering from skin and stomach diseases as getting clean drinking water is a problem here, they said.
As house walls remain soaked for days together, the fear of wall collapse is also haunting them as the family of Dhruba Sahu had a narrow escape Sunday when a portion of his kitchen collapsed.
Protesting the apathy of the administration the villagers are going to stage a sit-in. “If immediate steps are not taken to solve our problems, we will stage a sit-in at the tehsil office,” warned villagers Dhrubananda Naik, Bisikeshan Naik, Athani Naik, Laxmisagar Naik and others.
Tehsildar Amrit Sarkar said he would send the revenue inspector (RI) to the village. “Steps will be taken after getting a report from him,” he added.
PNN