The Communist Party of India has announced to continue its tirade against the Central and State governments till justice is rendered to the last victim of the recent floods that rocked the Rayalaseema region.
Party national general secretary D. Raja, who visited the villages downstream of Annamayya project that inundated due to the flood fury on Friday, called it a failure on part of the administrators to reach out to the victims more than a fortnight after the incident.
Accompanied by State secretary K. Ramakrishna, he toured Pulaputhur and Mandapalli villages that witnessed flash floods, and interacted with the villagers. He felt that the government had not taken a serious note of the loss of human and cattle lives, crops and property in the disaster and demanded a timeline on the rehabilitation measures promised.
Speaking to the media, he demanded that the Annamayya project be rebuilt with modern technology making it strong enough to withstand such calamities. Loudly wondering why not even a single Central minister had visited the villages to restore confidence among the people. he demanded that the flood be declared a ‘national calamity’.
Talking to the irrigation engineers, he questioned them as to why the gates of the project were not lifted to facilitate outflow, knowing fully well that the water gushing from the Pincha project in the upper reaches could wreak havoc.
Mr. Ramakrishna criticised the State government for announcing a “paltry” ₹5 lakh to the kin of the 69 deceased in the five districts, which he termed as ‘peanuts’ compared to the ₹1 crore ex-gratia announced to the gas leak victims of Visakhapatnam in the past.
“There is no action after the Chief Minister’s aerial survey and the announcement of five cents of land for the victims’ families”, he lamented, while demanding ₹25 lakh to the family of every deceased person. He pegged the crop loss due to submergence in a whopping 60 lakh acres in the five southern districts, for which he sought a decent compensation.
