BHUBANESWAR: Opposition BJP and Congress on Thursday hit out at the State government over implementation of its ‘Pucca Ghar Yojana’ after the latter claimed to have shifted more than seven lakh people from thatched houses and low-lying areas to cyclone shelters before very severe cyclone Yaas crossed Odisha coast.
“If the government’s propaganda of providing concrete houses to lakhs of people is true, what was the need of shifting them to cyclone shelters ahead of the storm,” questioned deputy leader of Opposition Bishnu Charan Sethi.
Sethi said that the Centre had sanctioned eight lakh concrete houses for the State under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY). But during every cyclone, the State government claims shifting lakhs of people to safer places, he said, adding, this has raised questions on the implementation of the Pucca Ghar scheme.
President of Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) Niranjan Patnaik also criticised the government over the issue. Quoting government statistics, Patnaik said more than seven lakh people including 1.9 lakh from Balasore were evacuated to cyclone shelters.
Odisha has faced eight storms of varying intensities since the 1999 super cyclone and every time the government claims to have shifted more people, he said. “Let the government clarify about the lakhs of Pucca Ghar which it claimed to have provided to the people,” Patnaik said.