The District Disaster Management Committee in Myagdi, one of the worst-hit districts by water-induced disasters, has recommended the provincial and federal governments to relocate 1,086 families to safer locations.

The committee has prepared a report after analysing data collected by the local units, the District Police Office and based on field reports of various individuals and organisations. The committee, headed by the chief district officer, said that 1,086 households of 81 different settlements in Myagdi should be shifted to safer locations at the earliest.

“We have recommended the relocation of the families after identifying the settlements at risk. The committee has included the experience of the victims as well as the local bodies in the report,” said Chief District Officer Umakanta Adhikari. The committee’s meeting chaired by Adhikari on Sunday decided to send its report to the federal, provincial and local governments, recommending them to shift the settlements that are at high risk to safer locations.

The District Disaster Management Committee included in its report that 247 families whose houses were completely destroyed by this year’s landslides and floods and 821 other families at high risk in Dhaulagiri, Malika and Annapurna and other local units need to be shifted to safer locations.

However, the report fails to mention any modality to find safe locations for the resettlement and rehabilitation of the affected families. Adhikari claimed that the process of moving the settlements at risk would begin only after a team of geologists from the centre studies the area and identifies safer places for relocation.

According to the data available at the provincial Ministry of Internal Affairs and Law, a total of 31 people died, five others went missing and 636 families were displaced in separate incidents of landslides and floods in Myagdi this year.

Though the District Disaster Management Committee has recommended that the government shift the settlements to safe locations, the locals are reluctant to leave their old settlements. The villagers of Marang, a landslide-affected settlement in Dhaulagiri, said that they would not leave their village.

“How can we go elsewhere when our land is here? The government plans to build us houses somewhere else but they will not give us land to work on,” said Bhim Prasad Jugjali of Marang, who lost his wife, two daughters and a daughter-in-law in the landslide in July.

“The affected people have urged us to resettle them near their old settlement without disturbing the cluster based on their settlements and ethnicity,” said Thamsara Pun, the chairperson of Dhaulagiri Rural Municipality.

In its report, the committee said that 209 houses of 15 settlements in Dhaulagiri, 375 houses of 22 settlements in Malika, 137 houses of eight settlements in Annapurna, 161 houses of 15 settlements in Raghuganga, 100 houses of nine settlements in Mangala and 86 houses of 12 settlements in Beni Municipality should be relocated to safer locations. According to the committee, this year’s landslides and floods destroyed 84 drinking water projects, 46 irrigation canals, 32 agricultural farms, 31 school buildings, 17 micro-hydropower projects, eight community buildings, seven health post buildings and one ward office building in the district.

The Gandaki provincial government last week urged the federal government to declare Myagdi a natural disaster-hit district. The federal government has already declared Sindhupalchok and Baglung as disaster-hit districts.