National
Plan to build houses cost free for quake victims
National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) has come up with a new working guideline to reconstruct houses for earthquake victims - disabled, elderly people, single women and orphans - free of cost.Anup Ojha
National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) has come up with a new working guideline to reconstruct houses for earthquake victims - disabled, elderly people, single women and orphans - free of cost.
With the NRA’s new working guideline, the authority has made four categories of quake-affected people, whose house will be built spending Rs 300,000. The authority has said to reconstruct the houses for people above 70 years who do not have other family members, people with disabilities who own red card (who can’t move) and Blue card (can travel with the help of wheel chair).
The houses will also be made for free for widows above 65 years and orphans below 16 years whose homes were demolished by the April 25 earthquake and its subsequent aftershocks.
NRA Chief Executive Officer Yubaraj Bhusal said, “In our field visit, we found many disable people, elderly and orphans people who were not able to build their own houses. They were deprived of the government grant due to their physical problems. That is why we came up with this new plan.”
According to the NRA, an estimated 1,000 such families come under the four categories. The Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MFALD) has mobilised its volunteers in 282 places to trace people under the categories in 32 districts that were affected by the quake.
Bhusal said, as per the data given by MFALD, till the date around 700 such households are found and it is still working to find such families. It has mobilised local municipalities and rural municipalities for this.
The NRA disburses a grant of Rs. 300,000 to earthquake victims in three installments. The first installment includes 50,000, the second Rs 150,000 and the final is Rs. 100,000. The Cabinet under the former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, on January 24 had decided to provide an additional assistance of Rs. 100,000, increasing the grant total to Rs. 400,000.
“We will construct new homes for the people who come under the four categories within this fiscal year,” he said. When asked about the financial management for the new houses, Bhusal said, the NRA will work with local bodies, various international donor organisations, INGOs and aluminises.
“Many philanthropic organisations have shown interest to reconstruct such houses with their funds and expertise. The NRA will coordinate with them and provide them our engineers,” said Bhusal.
In this fiscal year, the government has allocated Rs. 53 billion to the NRA. The NRA is still expecting additional Rs. 100 billion to provide grants of already declared Rs. 300,000 to the families of the earthquake victims.