A Dalit man who is hailing from Odisa’s Kendrapara has been seen as spending his daily life inside a toilet built under the flagship programme Swachh Bharat Mission. He was forced to live inside the toilet after the cyclone ” Fani” took his home to the ground.
The cyclone hit the district on May 3. Rendered homeless, Khirod Jena (58), a landless daily wage earner in Raghudeipur village, has been living in 7 feet x 6 feet toilet along with his spouse and two grown-up daughters.
The cyclone destroyed my house. But the pucca toilet was saved. I have nowhere to go. The toilet allotted to me two days back has become my shelter house. I do not know how long we will be staying here,” Jena said.
There are no resources available for him for rebuilding his house.
He has also asserted that till the authorities serve him the compensation, he will continue to live in a toilet. With toilet being occupied, we are forced to defecate in open now,” he said.
I had applied for housing grant either under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) or under Biju Pucca ghar scheme. But the housing grants had eluded me. The cyclone would have spared my house if my kutcha house would have taken the form of pucca dwelling unit with government assistance. But that was not to be,” he asserted with pain.
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