NCSC head faults Odisha govt in palm chopping incident

OST Bureau
Bhawanipatna, Jan 7:

Slamming the Odisha government over the palm chopping of two labourers in Kalahandi district, the National Commission for Scheduled Caste (NCSC) today called the unfortunate incident as an outcome of the state government’s failure to implement MGNREGA.
Briefing newsmen here after visiting the two dalit victims, NCSC chairman Dr P L Punia blamed the state government, the district administration and the police for their gross failure to handle the palm chopping case.
While alleging delay in conduct of investigations into the barbaric incident, Punia said the NCSC will conduct a hearing to provide justice to the victims. He lamented that the state government had so far only provided pnly Rs 2 lakh each to the two victims as assistance.
The NCSC chairman said people were forced to migrate in search of work to other states as the state government failed to provide jobs to them in their area. This goes to show that it was not implementing MGNREGA properly, he said.
Emphasizing proper implementation of MGNREGA, Dr Punia questioned why would people migrate to distant places and face exploitation if work was available in their locality. He asked the state government for proper execution of NREGA and to safeguard the interest of dalits.
Later, the NCSC addressed a meeting of dalits at Balipada village and laid the foundation of Ambedkar Bhawan there.