Officials fail to the check plight of endosulfan victims’

Mangalore Today News Network

Udupi, July 17, 2015 :  Addressing the media Japti Satyanarayana Udupa, general secretary of district unit of the Bharatiya Kisan Sangha, July 16 said that despite a High Court order, persons suffering from disabilities due to the spraying of endosulfan in Udupi district were not getting pension and other facilities due to the insensitivity of officials.

  Udupa also said that as per the information provided by the district administration to the High Court, there were 1,317 affected persons in 88 villages in Udupi district. But so far, there had been no medical check-up of 178 persons in six villages here.

The victims of the six villages questioned the authorities that they were told that the villages did not come under the jurisdiction where the pesticide was sprayed. As many cashew plantations were located on uplands, the pesticide would have washed down with rain water to low lands, thereby affecting the surrounding villages.

According to the sangha, besides the 88 villages, 62 villages nearby too had been affected by the spraying. But the Health Department had not carried out medical check-up in these 62 villages. Of these, 37 villages were in Kundapur taluk, 17 in Udupi taluk and eight in Karkala taluk. Interestingly, medical check-up was done in some of the villages that were not listed as affected.

Of the 1,317 affected persons, 210 were children aged below 10, while 80 were aged below five. The court had directed that there should be proper scanning of pregnant women in the district. But so far no steps had been taken.

At least 300 victims were not getting their monthly pension and some were getting the pension once in three or four months. Some others had not got it for 13 months. Though an amount of Rs. 3.03 crore should be spent in giving pensions to the victims, an amount of Rs. 3.08 crore had been spent on it, with the additional expenditure of Rs. 5.48 lakh being unaccounted for.