Half of flood-affected families want govt to provide land or house

Kathmandu, Oct. 18: Half of the people who lost their houses in the devastating Bhotekoshi flood that occurred on August 26 want the government to provide them land or housing facility. 

Of the flood-damaged 4,151 building structures belonging to 3,067 property owners, about one-third house-owners want to settle at the government-provided land. Number of such households is 939 (30.62 per cent), while 590 households (19.24 per cent) stated that they would be willing to live in a location where the government provided collective housing.

This puts the total share of house-owners wishing the government provide them land or house at 49.86 per cent. 

Still, a quarter of the families that lost their houses in the flood want to continue dwelling in their pre-flood location. 

According to the preliminary report of the household survey conducted by the National Planning Commission (NPC) and published on Friday, of the 3,067 owners of the houses damaged in the devastating Bhotekoshi flood, 797 households or 26 per cent choose the location affected by the flood as the preferred place for permanent residence in the future. 

Similarly, 565 households (18.42 per cent) expressed a preference to settle on another plot of land they owned within their district, while 159 households (5.18 per cent) opted to settle on land they owned elsewhere in the country. No response regarding preferred permanent residence in the future was recorded for 17 households.

The flood damaged 4,151 building structures belonging to 3,067 property owners. They include 1,236 structures belonging to 882 property owners were damaged in Rasuwa, 2,256 structures belonging to 1,686 property owners in Nuwakot, 630 structures belonging to 480 property owners in Dhading, and 29 structures belonging to 19 property owners in Gorkha.

Of these structures, 2,792 were houses, 288 were cattle sheds, storage sheds or traditional livestock shelters (goth/dhansar/matan), 651 were truss structures, 263 were temporary shelters and 142 were other types of structures. The type of 15 structures could not be identified.