Shelling-hit look for safe lodging on their own

Dinesh Mahotra & Amir Karim Tantray

Tribune News Service

Jammu, November 1

Girdhari Lal, a resident of Treva border village, is in Bishnah town in search of rented accommodation because his family members are not safe because of the shelling from across the border.

It is not easy for Lal, a Class-IV government employee, to afford rented accommodation at Bishnah in Jammu district but he has decided to withdraw his fixed deposit as his family’s security is his priority. He has decided to shift his family to Bishan because death is looming large at his shelling-hit village.

Girdhari Lal’s is not an isolated case. There are scores of families in forward areas who have shifted to nearby towns or villages without waiting for the authorities to set up camps. 

Tilak Raj of Allah village, which is situated on the International Border, was fortunate to get rented accommodation in Bishnah but there are many others who are still searching for a safe place to reside in. 

“Politicians and officers are repeatedly making big announcements about providing shelter to us at safer places but on the ground nothing has been done,” Raj alleged, adding that hundreds of families from the border belt of the Jammu region have taken accommodation on rent on their own at safer areas.

Referring to today’s shelling casualties at Ramgarh, Tilak Raj said the killings had debunked the tall claims of the authorities.

Sources told The Tribune the administration had decided to evacuate around 50 villages, displacing nearly 37,000 people, on the 198-km-long International Border. This decision has been taken after the Pakistan Rangers resorted to unprovoked shelling on the International Border since morning. 

Already a few hundred people are staying in migrant camps set up by the administration but mostly people have arranged their own accommodation. “The intense shelling from Pakistan today made panic-stricken people leave their homes and head for safer areas. This forced the administration to officially evacuate villages to avoid collateral damage,” said a source in the administration. On the Line of Control too, people have been asked to move to safer places.