MPs to visit Orissa to review drought aid

Senior Rajya Sabha MPs are to visit the drought-hit areas of Orissa when Parliament takes a three-week break from March 21.

The members of Parliament will review implementation of the relief schemes announced by the federal government over the last three years.

These include a relief fund of Rs 500 million announced by Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda on November 14 when he visited the state.

The immediate reason for the MPs's trip to Orissa seems to have been triggered by the federal government's allocation of Rs 370 million last fortnight for the development of the state. The money is to be drawn from the Rs 500 million fund already announced by the prime minister.

Vice-President K R Narayan will decide the team's leader by the weekend.

Bolangir is one of the worst affected areas in Orissa. Satyachandra Patnayyak, the Lok Sabha MP from the district, told Rediff On The NeT, "This is most important to us. All over the country people talked about the cyclone in Andhra Pradesh but Orissa missed their concern despite the state witnessing an exodus of hundreds of thousands of people who had to go without food and water."

Kalahandi, Bolangir, Nawapara and Sonepur districts of the state were declared drought-prone due to poor rainfall over the last three years.

In all of Bolangir there have been no crops for three years as it did not rain at all. In Kalahandi, of the 13 administrative blocks, 10 had no harvest. In Naupada, of the five blocks, crops failed in four. In Sonepur, of the six blocks, no crops grew in five.

Though newspaper reports have been full of accounts of several starvation deaths, government officials still do not have a white paper confirming the tragedy.

Six rivers flow through the four unfortunate districts. But Tel, Sukhtel, Indra, Songadh, Lanth and Undeer are all as dry as stone and there is no water to even drink.

Says Patnayyak "In my constituency people draw drinking water from bore wells. But even that will not last if it does not rain this year."

During the Congress reign, Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao had visited the drought-hit areas in the state and announced Rs 44.57 billion as aid. However, after the Congress lost its mandate, the promise was not followed up by the United Front government.