Incident Reports

Data mismatch complicates relief distribution for conflict victims

2014-09-24

Baitadi,Tathyank bemel hunale dwandpidit ka laagi rahat vitaran jatil. BAITADI, SEP 24 - The differences in the tally of number of people missing during the conflict era in the district amongst various organisations has invited disorder in the relief distribution. The International Red Cross Society (ICRC), Baitadi, has a list of nine people missing while the local peace committee has 26 missing and Informal Sector Service Centre (INSEC) has 12 on their list. With this, the organisations providing relief are in quandary over identifying the actual number of people missing. As per the local peace committee, 16 families of the missing have already received Rs 300,000 as relief from the government. But amongst them were people that have migrated and lost contact and were in fact not the victims of the insurgency, it has been revealed. Acknowledging the irregularity, coordinator of the committee Keshab Bahadur Chand said that discrepancies might have possibly occurred for they used the data provided by the VDC, local administration, and the police. The victims, however, complain that compensation has been provided on the basis of political influence and not necessarily to the actual victims. According to the disgruntled victims, those who are in regular contact with their families and people suffering from mental disorders have also had their hands on the relief provided by the government specifically to the kins of those missing during the decade long insurgency in the country. INSEC representative Sher Bahadur Chand urged all the organisations to work together in bringing out a uniform list of missing people. “As there are also some names that appear both in the list of the dead and the missing, we need to further filter the names,” Chand said. Psychological counsellor for the ‘Haatemalo’ programme run by ICRC, Tek Bahadur Khadka, also stressed on the need to provide a factual list so that the actual victims get timely relief. The ICRC has been running the ‘Haatemalo’ programme targeting the families of the missing and helping ease their transition by providing psychological counselling among others. After 2011, the government decided to provide family members of those missing during the insurgency a cheque of Rs 300,000 each. Prior to that, only the kin of those dead during the period received the relief.

0 Comments