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Cold affects poor people in Tarai
The onset of winter has severely affected the impoverished communities of Musahar, Dom and Chamar in Province 2.
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Published at : November 24, 2018
Updated at : November 24, 2018 08:17
Janakpur
The onset of winter has severely affected the impoverished communities of Musahar, Dom and Chamar in Province 2.
Fifty-year-old Goniya Sada of Janakpur-7 said she is unable to sleep at night due to the increasing cold.
“I have no money to purchase warm clothes, so I have started to sleep during day time when it is relatively warmer,” Sada said, adding that she has been sleeping on a straw bed.
Similarly, 70-year-old Kheka Sada of Janakinagar said she does not have sufficient clothes to keep warm.
“I sit around bonfires to keep myself warm at night,” she said.
Most of the people belonging to impoverished communities said their only recourse
in the cold is sitting around bonfires.
However, women of Musahar settlements are busy weaving straw mats for the cold nights. “We cannot afford warm mattresses or blankets, so we have to depend on straw mats for warmth during winter,” said Samuniya Dhanukar of Masuhari Tole.
She added that they are compelled to stay in poorly built huts and wear torn clothes due to poverty.
Also, the daily lives of impoverished families in Rautahat have been affected by cold temperatures.
Last year, nine people in the district died of suspected hypothermia. Most of them were from Dalit settlements.
Aklu Musahar, the Musahar leader from Dumariya village, said, “Poor people like us find it very difficult to survive winter. We can barely manage two meals a day, how can we purchase warm clothes in this poverty?” He added that the children and senior citizens are affected the most in this cold weather.
There are more than 13,000 people from Musahar community and around 5,000 people from Dom community in Rautahat.
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