BAJURA: Locals have returned the relief materials distributed in Badimalika Municipality-4 of Bajura district claiming that they were of poor quality and couldn't be consumed.

According to Narendra Nath, a local, all the rice distributed in the ward were discoloured and rotten. The locals have asked the municipality to take back the substandard food item.

Badimalika-4 had distributed 70 packages of 30 kg each rice --20 kg per family to 30 households and 10 kg per person to 145-- in the ward, informed ward chair Surendra Nath. The relief materials were bought by municipality from Nepal Food Corporation (NFC) and allocated to the wards to distribute them to those who were unable to put food on their table after their earnings were affected by the nationwide lockdown.

Nath admitted to the fact that six packages were found to be rotten and would be returned to NFC.

"The sold rice were stored last year and it is possible for the rice to go bad during the storage and transportation," claimed NFC's Bajura branch chief Mekhraj Ojha. The rotten rice will be taken back, he added.

Badimalika has already bought 150 quintal of rice from the NFC to distribute as relief materials as per the decision made by the municipality, informed Badimalika chair Padam Baduwal. He added that there were no precedence of rice being substandard before the incident in ward 4.