Kavre administration office distributing relief to fake victims

Kavre, January 10

The District Administration Office in Kavre is said to have been distributing the government-allotted relief amount of Rs 10,000, meant to buy warm clothes, to fake quake victims in the district.

The DAO has been distributing Rs 10,000 to bogus quake victims who had managed to bag the relief amount of Rs 15,000 meant for constructing makeshift tents six months ago.

The administration has been distributing the relief amount even to those people who have cases filed against them at the office for being fake victims.

Though some of the bogus victims had earlier returned the relief amount of Rs 15,000, DAO is giving away Rs 10,000 meant for warm clothes to the victims without conducting any investigation.

VDC Welfare Protection Forum Kavre District Chairman and Patalekhet VDC Secretary Biswonath Dahal said his office was having a tough time distributing the relief meant for warm clothes as DAO was yet to probe into fake quake victims.

According to Dahal, they would eventually distribute the relief fund in a haphazard manner as DAO had failed to launch investigation into cases file at the administration. Cases have been filed against 12 fake quake victims from Dahal’s VDC alone.

Of the 145 bogus quake victims found after the joint team from the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers and National Vigilance Centre launched a monitoring drive in Kavre’s Mahadevsthan VDC, only a negligible number have returned the relief amount of Rs 15,000.

A DAO staff said the administration had distributed the relief amount of Rs 10,000 to a dozen fake quake victims who were earlier freed after being quizzed.

Earlier, the Office of the Prime Minister had directed Kavre DAO to cancel the quake victims’ ID cards and return the relief amount.

In Mahadevsthan VDC alone, as much as Rs 29 million was spent on bogus victims as relief meant for makeshift shelters.

As many as 560 fake victims of ward No 16 and 17 of Panchkhal Municipality had somehow procured the

victims’ ID cards and received the relief amount of Rs 15,000 each.

As many as 3,500 fake victims have received relief amount in Kavre.

Since the DAO earlier freed the fake victims after only quizzing them, many such victims received the fund for warm clothes.

Kavre CDO Madan Bhujel, however, refuted the allegation and said DAO had probed fake quake victims. “DAO has looked into the fake victims’ cases. If more cases are registered, we shall take appropriate action against them,” he pledged.

Earlier, Rs 15,000 was distributed to each of the 83,428 quake victim families as recommended by local bodies after the deadly quake struck the country in April 25, 2015. Due to fund crunch, Kavre DAO has been able to distribute relief meant for buying warm clothes to quake victims of only two municipalities and 59 VDCs. Kavre district comprises five municipalities and 76 VDCs.

According to District Disaster Relief and Rescue Committee, as many as 50,270 houses were completely damaged while 23,784 houses sustained partial damage due to the tremor and subsequent aftershocks.