No pucca road, reaching school arduous task for village children

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Rajiv Mahajan

Nurpur, May 14

Jumbal-Lohara village in the Nagaal gram panchayat of the Fatehpur Assembly constituency is without road connectivity even 76 years after Independence. In case of a medical emergency, the villagers have to walk 1.5 km to reach a link road as the existing kutcha path in the village is in a bad shape.

Forty-five families living in the area are a harried lot as their village is without road connectivity due to the apathy of successive governments. In election time, politicians assure them that a pucca road would be built so that ambulances could access the village.

The village is approachable from a link road through a 1.5-km kutcha path, which turns dangerously slippery after rain. The residents have been demanding for over a decade that a metalled road to the village be constructed, but they have got nothing but lip service.

According to Ravinder Kumar, an elected ward member, villagers have to carry patients or expectant mothers for 1.5 km to reach the pucca road at Larkhu, from where they are taken to the Fatehpur Civil Hospital by some vehicle.

Gagan Singh, a villager serving in the Army, lamented that children had to walk 3 to 3.5 km to reach the nearest Government Senior Secondary School at Bhadiyali. “In view of the difficulty our children face in reaching the school, my wife is living in a rented house at Fatehpur, 10 km from the village, to ensure better schooling for them,” he said.

Anita Devi, another villager, lamented that no proposals are coming for village youths who have reached marriageable age, as the village lacks proper connectivity. Sushma Devi, a mother of three whose husband died 16 months ago, said she had sent her two kids to her relatives so that they can continue with their studies as she could not send them to a school at Bhadiyali, which is 3.5 km from home, on foot.

Ramesh Kalia, a social activist and a regular visitor to the village, appealed to the government to build an ambulance road after the poll code ends. Sources say a few years ago, a 135-metre pucca road was constructed with the MGNREGA funds, but the work was left midway for want of land required for the road.