EXCLUSIVE It was ironic to see 16 fresh graves, most of them belong to infants who died because of cold, near Malakpur camp in Shamli district. Unfortunately, these graves escaped the eye of government officials who were faithfully collecting data and building records in the same relief camp.
Three months after the communal violence in Muzaffarnagar and its surrounding districts, the victims are still languishing in the relief camps. Thirty children living in several relief camps in and around Muzaffarnagar district have died due to the cold and what is worse is that the Uttar Pradesh government is not ready to acknowledge it.
While the Supreme Court took suo motu cognizance of the loss of lives in Shamli camps, Daily Bhaskar has accessed the Shamli district administration report sent to the UP home secretary claiming that no child died or was seriously ill in relief camps.
Even though Muzaffarnagar District Magistrate Kaushal Raj Sharma confirmed deaths of 11 children in relief camps in the district, Daily Bhaskar's investigation in adjacent Shamli district reveal a picture of amazing laxity as winter approaches for the victims who continue to languish in different relief camps with little medical care or protection.
Thirty deaths have been reported from Malakpur camp alone. The camp still accommodates 4,500 people. Some of the deaths have occurred due to exposure to cold and others due to diseases and infections in the dearth of any medical facilities available to them.
Adjacent to the camp was a tent of government officials who had come here to visit relief camps in the area. According to the camp dwellers, the officials visited them for the first time in the past three months.
Responding to a question regarding the number of deaths in the relief camps, Director General (Health) Dr AS Rathor, who was heading the team of doctors, shrugged shoulders in disagreement and refused to acknowledge that any death has occurred so far.
When quoted victims' account and media reports, he called them farce and a hand job of media personals to defame the state government. Later, when he was taken to a graveyard located few yards away from the camp where 16 fresh graves of children were found, Rathor said told Daily Bhaskar, "We need to investigate into the matter."
When asked about the mechanism of his "investigation", he tried to entangle this correspondent into a complex network of legalities pertaining to the registration of these deaths. "We will acknowledge any death only if the victim gets that registered and produces a death certificate," Rathor said.
On continuous request, the team of the government doctors headed by Director General Rathor agreed to visit other camps located in the area. On reaching Nurpur camp, located some few kilometers away from the Malakpur camp, we witnessed even worse conditions. There was no medical camp, no sanitation facility, no water supply and all we could see was distorted tents, terribly exposed to chilly winters already set in the area and gloomy faces with no hopes of a better future for them.
Confusing the team of journalists as a part of the government delegation, one of the victims said in anger, "We have no hopes of you. If you have come here to give us consolations, I request you to please make necessary arrangements for our shelter and safety."
It was only after we convinced them that we have come here to help you and not as a part of any government’s body, they started talking to us while those accompanying the government officials stood firm in negligence to the existing conditions and emphasized on doing some paper works pertaining to this camp. The camp houses 1300 people.
The victims told us that there has been no medical facility in this camp from the government’s side. It is the first time that a high-level government official was visiting them.
So far, two deaths have been reported from the camp, both of them were children of fewer than five years of age. The government officials in explanation could only give an assurance of medical facilities here.
As we further moved towards one more camp set up in Suneti village, the condition of that camp was even more dreaded. Children were lying on the muddy ground with just a cover of thin sheet of a bed.
People refused to speak out fearing the repercussions from the government side. An old woman in a sarcastic style expressed her discontent and said, "Everything is good here for the past three months. We are having a life of luxury which we could have never imagined in life before. So please go from here, we don't need any ones help."
Shockingly, these remarks of the women were taken seriously by Dr Rathor who asked his people to move to the next camp until we stopped him from proceeding and asked him to investigate into the deaths that have taken place here.
The investigation revealed that so far, six people have died in the last 15 days here. The names of the deceased are as follows: Fatima (4 years), Firdaus (six days), Zoya (5 years), Firoz (20 days), Umar (8 days) and Sadil (4 years).
The situation at the Suneti camp turned dramatic when the team of the government doctors refused to acknowledge these deaths after they were narrated by the parents of the deceased children. This ignited infuriation among the victims and they surrounded the vehicle of Shamli Chief Medical Officer Lokesh Kumar Gupta and threatened not to leave until he acknowledges the death of their children.
Responding to this, the CMO fled the area but sooner he was chased down by the angry villagers and was stopped at distance of two kilometers from the camp. He was let to go only after an assurance that he will complete all the legal procedures in establishing these deaths at the soonest.
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