Kendrapara: The CM’s Additional Secretary recently directed Collector Dasarathi Satapathy to submit a detailed report within a week on the plight of Dalits staying in the Matiasahi Basti of Angulai Gram Panchayat in Marshaghai block, official sources said.
The direction of the Additional Secretary came after a news report was published in Orissa POST November 13 under the headline ‘Housing benefits a pipe dream for Dalit villagers’, said DIPRO Chandrakant Nayak of Kendrapara.
The Collector directed the DIPRO Saturday to send a letter to the BDO of Marshaghai block asking him to conduct a thorough inquiry and submit a detailed report to be sent to the office of CM’s Additional Secretary, Nayak said.
It may be noted that the sorry plight of the Dalits of Matiasahi was brought out in a report published in Orissa Post.
Around 70 families numbering 500 people are staying at Matiasahi basti, which comes under Ward No: 10.
The villagers generally work as construction labourers. Most of them are illiterate. Although they have been staying in the locality since decades they have not been provided basic facilities.
The villagers failed to get houses under government sponsored housing schemes. They also face water shortage. The Anganwadi centre is unfinished.
District administration officials never visited the basti to study their problems. Although they have voter ID cards, Aadhaar cards and some elderly persons are getting subsidised grain under NFSA and old age and widow pensions, the district administration failed to enrol them for housing schemes.
Due to ignorance the Dalits of Matiasahi failed to get benefits of welfare schemes. They do not know about Harischandra Yojana, Mahaprayan Yojana, Biju Swasthya Bima Yojana and their benefits.
The government has been providing toilets under Swachha Bharat Abhijana, but it is yet to reach the village. Everybody goes to the roadside or open fields to defecate.
Locals said the main problem of the Dalits is that most families are staying in dilapidated buildings without doors and windows. The buildings were constructed by the Karnataka Government after the 1999 super cyclone.
The buildings are now totally rundown. Portions of roofs are falling down. Even a slight drizzle forces families to take shelter at the local Mathasahi Project Primary School.
Most of the time the houses are wet as rainwater enters houses through open doors and windows. Vipers also enter houses regularly.
Even though the villagers knocked on the doors of the Sarpanch, the BDO and the Collector to get them enrolled in Central or state housing schemes, their pleas were ignored.
The Socio-Economic Caste Enumeration drive has not been carried out in this village.
PNN