Rautes’ hope for homes dashed

Amargadi, August 16

The government had come up with a project named Housing for Raute under the People’s Housing Programme nine years ago.

At that time there were 86 Raute families at Jogbudha in Dadeldhura district.

The Raute people have been enlisted as endangered indigenous people and it is the responsibility of the State to provide them protection.

Under the project, 41 families at Parshuram Municipalit7y were selected as entitled to the houses. Later, a case was filed at the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority against 108 community forests in Jogbudha before the project was completed.

With the registration of the case, timber collection from such forests ceased and this impacted the project.

Shortage of timber forced the project to come to a halt before completion.

Later, the Special Court allowed the sale of timber cut at that time in the community forests , but it was not available for construction of houses for Rautes. Houses for one dozen of Raute people are yet to be constructed.

Local Santidevi Raute said they could not get homes as community forests refused to provide timber to them.

“Though we are consumers of the community forest, we have been deprived of timber,’’ she said. Delay in completing the project has also caused the discontinuation of budget allocation, dashing the hopes for getting new homes. Some half-built houses are in dilapidated condition, said Raute leader.

Feature Photo: File

A version of this article appears in e-paper on August 17, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.