Dispute over continuance of relief camp for sea erosion-hit families at Cheriyakadavu
A heated exchange erupted between the sea erosion-hit families in Chellanam panchayat and Revenue officials over the continuation of a relief camp at the parish hall of the Cheriyakadavu church on Thursday evening.
Since the parish hall has been booked for a function on Sunday, the church officials, in consultation with Revenue officials, informed the camp residents that the camp would be wound up after lunch on Friday, and that the residents may move to a school at Kalathara near Palluruthy. But the Chellanam-Kochi Janakeeya Vedhi protested this decision, citing the distance, and how it would affect the schooling of children of families in the relief camp.
Revenue officials claimed that only four of the eight families with fully damaged houses were at the camp as they could not afford to find rented accommodations. They claimed that the other four families had moved out on rent to places much farther away than the school at Kalathara to debunk the complaint about distance. However, the Vedhi countered, claiming that there were even more families with their houses hardly habitable.
Eventually, it was decided that the camp residents would be shifted to the Cheriyakadavu school in the immediate neighbourhood of the parish hall on Sunday and then moved back into the hall the next day. The hall has not been booked for any function for the next fortnight after this Sunday, giving the authorities enough time to find a solution.
Meanwhile, priests from the Kochi and Alappuzha dioceses are set to stage a day-long hunger strike at the Thoppumpady BOT Junction on Friday, demanding a permanent solution to sea erosion in Chellanam panchayat. This comes close on the heels of three days of siege of the Fort Kochi-Alappuzha State highway for three consecutive days at Kannamaly before it was called off on Wednesday.
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