Satbhaya residents set deadline for rehabilitation

Kendrapada,Nov 17 (UNI) Living on the verge of threatened sea erosion the residents of Satbhaya and Kanhupur have set November 23 as the deadline for their rehabilitation.

Under the banner of Satabhaya Rehabilitation Committee, the villagers have threatened to stage a dharana before the District Magistrate's office on November 24 if the authority failed to take up the rehabilitation work.

A decision in this regard was taken by the sea erosion prone villagers in a meeting organised by the Satabhaya Rehabilitation Committee at the local panchayat office on Friday last to protest the 'callous and slipshod' attitude of the government, Satbhaya Sarpanch cum president of Satabhaya Rehabilitation Committee Sushmita Das.

She said long back the state government has taken a decision to initiate steps on rehabilitation project to settle the villagers threatened by constant sea erosion, by constructing resettlement colony at Bagapatia.

Again on August 12 last a high-level meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, agreed to shift the 483 odd families of the Satbhaya and Kanhupur villages to a safer place with immediate effect.

Ms Das said the state government also identified four alternative sites such as Magarkanda, Rabindrapalli, Dantiapada and Padmanav Patana for rehabilitating the villagers under the project and directed the District Magistrate to make a field visit and convince the people about the proposal.

The DM was also asked to submit a detailed enquiry report before the state government within a week.

Sources said DM Sisirkanta Panda made a field visit along with Rajnagar DFO P K Behera to the two villages in order to access the situation.

Since last several decades, the people in these two villages known for their dare-devilry attitude in facing the onslaught of Bay of Bengal, move from one place to another at least thrice in a year.

During the visit of the District Magistrate,the residents of Satabhaya and Kanhupur pressed their demand to set up the resettlement colony at Bagapati instead of four alternatives places identified earlier by the state government staging that the places selected by the government were low lying areas and nearer to the sea.

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