Joshimath: teary-eyed residents leave homes as demolition of unsafe properties begins

Residents in Joshimath bid tearful goodbyes to ancestral homes and age-old businesses as bulldozers moved in to demolish worn down properties.

As they move out of their homes, residents claim that the state or central government has not provided them with any assistance to vacate their homes.

'They marked our houses with a red cross and just asked us to leave,' says a resident sitting outside her house.

'We were not given any assistance. Since the past few days the officials have simply asked us to vacate our homes. We are really troubled,' adds the resident's brother.

Almost 131 families in total have so far been shifted to the temporary relief centres while the number of damaged houses in Joshimath has risen to 723, a bulletin from the Chamoli unit of Disaster Management Authority said on Tuesday.

There are 86 houses in the area demarcated as an unsafe zone. The district administration has put red cross marks on houses in the sinking town that are unsafe for living.

Kalpeshwari Rana, a hotel owner claimed, 'The NTPC tunnel construction is most probably responsible for the condition of our properties. Tell me, how can a single storeyed house put so much pressure to create such cracks?'

The national and state disaster response forces have been deployed to help the district administration in their relief and rehabilitation efforts.

Meanwhile, hotel owners said they came to know about the state government's decision through newspapers and demanded that a one-time settlement plan should have been offered to them before the decision to demolish their hotels.

The owner of a hotel about to be demolished said, 'Our hotel will be pulled down is really saddening and we had no knowledge it would happen today. We did not receive a notice. We instead read about it in the newspaper.'

with PTI inputs

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