Manipur CM asks officials to expedite construction of prefabricated houses for displaced

Imphal, June 23 Manipur Chief Minister N. Biren Singh on Friday visited Kwakta areas in Bishnupur district, where prefabricated houses would be constructed to provide temporary shelter to the people displaced in the ongoing ethnic violence.

After visiting the areas, Singh tweeted: "Inspected the site for construction of prefabricated houses at Kwakta, Bishnupur district to address the housing needs for the people displaced by the unfortunate violence in the state. This site is one of the many temporary facilities which is being developed by the state govt to accommodate people displaced by the violence at both the hills and the valley. In these difficult times, let us take all possible steps to bring peace in Manipur for good."

The Chief Minister has asked the officials to speed up the construction of the prefabricated temporary houses for the displaced people.

Chief Secretary Vineet Joshi, several other leaders and senior officials accompanied the Chief Minister.

Singh had earlier said that 4,000 prefabricated temporary homes would be constructed within two months for the people displaced in the ethnic violence, which broke out since May 3, and had so far has claimed 120 lives and injured around 400 people of different communities.

"Collection of construction materials and process to construct the temporary houses have already started to build the prefabricated temporary houses for the displaced people. After completion of the temporary houses, the inmates of the relief camps would be shifted there for a brief period before their permanent settlement at their original places," Singh had told the media.

In view of the ethnic strife in Manipur since May 3, approximately 50,650 men, women and children, displaced in the violence, are sheltered in 350 camps. Over 13,000 displaced people from Manipur so far also took shelter in Mizoram, Nagaland, and Assam.

An official statement said that the Manipur government has been running relief camps since May 3 for the displaced people in view of the prevailing law and order situation in various violence affected districts. The semi-permanent relief camps for the affected people have been set up in line with the basic minimum requirements as per the provisions of National Disaster Management Act's (NDMA) prescribed minimum standard in respect of shelter in relief camps.

Certain conditions were fulfilled while setting up a relief camp. These camps preferably opened in the existing government structures having basic minimum facilities and the buildings are well protected and secured, preferably by security personnel and Army, the statement said.

The building or site of these camps have easy access for fire tenders and have differently-abled friendly facilities and special care arrangements for pregnant and lactating mothers, children and elderly people. The district administrations have been arranging basic one time facilities and consumables like mattresses, cooking utensils, water tanks, toilet, food items, drinking water etc. for the inhabitants in the relief camps.

For these camps, a three level Relief Camp Management structure was set up to ensure effective functioning and monitoring of the camps in all the violence-affected districts.

The relief camps are supported by the district administration, which appointed one nodal officer for each camp who are responsible to provide support to the relief camp, in close coordination with the available Civil Society Organisations and local clubs, the statement added.

sc/vd