Khotang, July 22

Quake victims of Khotang district have been deprived of the first instalment of housing grant due to errors in the name list of victims registered with National Reconstruction Authority and District Treasury Controller Office, Khotang.

The earthquake victims at Durchhim of Halesi Tuwachung Municipality-5 and Chipring of Khotehang Rural Municipality-5 were deprived of the grant as the serial numbers of the beneficiaries provided by the NRA and DTCO didn’t match. As many as 234 households of Durchim and 68 households of Chipring could not get the house grant as a result.

Focal person Rabi Kiran Achayra at District Coordination Committee said they had started distributing the first instalment of the housing grant from June 2.

“But the quake victims of Durchhim and Chipring did not receive the grant amount,” he said. Achayra added that the victims who could not get the first instalment for the grant would get the amount in the next fiscal.

Coordinator Rajan Kumar BC at District Coordination Committee said the quake victims could not receive the cheque as there were errors in their name.

It is said the mistakes occurred due to the negligence on the part of the engineers deployed for collecting details. DCC stated that information regarding the issue had already been provided to National Reconstruction Authority.

Of the 8,843 quake victims, Rs 360,377,000 was distributed among 7,200 beneficiaries. It has been reported that Rs 375,117,000 was released from the authority for reconstruction of houses in Khotang. As many as 13,799 houses were damaged in the 2015 earthquakes in Khotang.