Panchayat, NGO come to aid of poor family of Nurpur

Rajiv Mahajan

Nurpur, May 11

The Kopra gram panchayat in Nurpur and an NGO have come to the rescue of Jandhu Ram (70) of Mehatti ward. The roof of his “kutcha” house was blown off during a storm around six months back.

He used to sell firewood to earn his livelihood and lives in a single room with his wife and two sons, after the second room too was damaged due to a storm.

No government agency or any gram panchayat had included this family in the Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) or below poverty line (BPL) list.

Panchayat Pradhan Meenu Devi noticed the condition of the family and initiated efforts to provide him with help. She approached Ranjit Bakhshi Jankalyan Foundation chairman Akil Bakhshi for extending aid for the construction of a “pucca” room for them. The foundation chairman agreed to bear 80 per cent of the expenditure to be incurred on the work. Meenu told The Tribune that 20 per cent of the cost was contributed by gram panchayat members and local residents.

She said though the family was eligible for benefits of government schemes, they had availed none. “His name has recently been considered for a subsidised ration scheme and in the panchayat’s IRDP list. There is no path or road leading to his house and the panchayat has approved Rs 5 lakh for the same. A path with interlocking tiles will be constructed soon. His name will also be included under the PM Awas Yojana,” she said.

Des Raj, a social activist and husband of the panchayat Pradhan, said he had also started collecting donations for the construction of the poor man’s house.

Jandhu Ram is getting old age pension and has no other source of income. Of his two sons, one works as a labourer whereas the other one is unemployed. Being landless, he was allotted eight kanals of agricultural land, over 25 years ago. But due to financial constraints, he had to sell major of the land and presently has only 10 marla land with him.

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