Tulsidas Palyekar’s life has been reduced to pacing about hisson’s room at National Burns Centre at Airoli. “I heard from people thatcompensation had been given to people to the tune of Rs 2 lakhs and above.However I have not received anything till date”, confirms Palyekar. Palyekarhas been out of his job on a never ending leave-without-pay, tending to his 11year old son.
The man who deserves Govt’s compensation has not been evenapproached by the Govt or ZIOTL to ask whether he has enough money. Why? “Theyare taking care of my son, no?”, asks the father naively.
Rs. 1.44 crores worth of compensation was sanctioned by ZIOTLfor 71 people. This was in addition to the Goa compensation of Rs. 5 lakh givento those dead and Rs. 1 lakh each to those injured. “We had given Rs. 2000 toRs. 3000 only for purchase of food and essentials only to people of theaffected area”, says a former official from State Disaster Management authority,“The compensation is given to each family and not individual family members asthe thumb rule is that disaster struck a household not individuals”.
But what happened was a windfall of sorts. Two of the localrepresentatives assigned by the locals to draw the list of those who had to becompensated themselves ended up cornering Rs 8 lakh each though they themselveslived half a kilometre away. “Rs 4 crores was supposed to be given to 85 peoplebut some who did not deserve it broke their old roofs and demolished theirwalls” says former Vasco MLA Jose Philip D’Souza. Philip said he spearheadedthe campaign to give rightful compensation to these people now regrets it. “Alot of the needy people never saw the money that was to be distributed”, admitsD’Souza, the former local MLA.
Incoidently, in the aftermath of the tragedy, politicalagents, supporters of the local MLA featured prominently in the list of beneficiaries.The government did not verify and justify the compensation being paid out ofthe kitty of a private company though the tragedy was a public event. Whilepeople with old abandoned houses, people living illegally in homes facingdemolition grabbed the doles, the unluckier ones like Palyekar await a helpinghand for their future.
