More than 13,000 households are found to be below poverty line in Jajarkot. A survey carried out among 27,407 families showed 13,995 families to be poverty-stricken.

As per the National Census 2067, Jajarkot has 30,000 households or a population of 171,000 among which more than 80,000 are living below poverty line.

Based on the data of 18 different government indexes, 8,474 families in Jajarkot were found to be poor, according to Poor Households Support Coordination Board Secretariat member, Bhesh Raj Rijal.

Rijal added that the Board is working with all its resources to prepare the data on the poor people in the district as per the government policy.

As per the data collected on basis of 18 different indexes including residence, drinking water, electricity, agricultural employment, and education and health facilities, around half the population of the district is found to be below poverty line.

The data was collected with help from social volunteers operating under various programmes of the District Development Committee and VDC employees.

Meanwhile, Chief District Officer, Janardhan Gautam, said there was a widespread discontent among the people in connection with the data collection that has left out some households.

The government had started distributing identity cards three years ago to the poverty-stricken households in 25 districts with an aim to effectively run the Public Welfare Programme.

The government will make public the list of poor households and distribute identity cards from the upcoming year, it is learnt. RSS