Kerala to utilise sponsorship of Karnataka, others for setting up townships for landslide survivors

Thiruvananthapuram: The Kerala government has finalised plans for setting up two townships for rehabilitating the survivors of the Mundakkai - Chooralmala landslides of Wayanad by making use of the sponsorships by various organisations and state governments, including Karnataka.

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Wednesday held a meeting with representatives of 38 sponsors who offered to construct over 100 houses. It included representatives of the Karnataka government as well as Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who offered to construct 100 houses each.

In order to ensure transparency an online tracking system has been developed to enable the sponsors track the progress of the work.

The townships will be set up in 58.50 hectares in Elstone estate near Kalpetta town and 48.96 hectares in Nedumbala estate near Meppadi. While houses will be constructed in areas of five cents each in Elstone estate. At Nedumbala, the houses will be constructed in ten cents. The list of beneficiaries will be finalised by January 25.

The Chief Minister said that apart from providing a 1,000-square-feet house to each family, there will be all sorts of amenities in the townships. Livelihood options will be also provided to the families as per their needs. A micro-level planning has been done by carrying out a survey among the 1,084 families comprising 4,658 persons who were affected.

Vijayan also flayed the delay on the part of the Centre in declaring the Wayanad landslide as a disaster of severe nature. If the declaration was made within two months of the July 30 disaster, the state could have received more support from agencies associated with the UN. He also flayed the centre for not writing off the bank dues of the landslide hit families.