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Gehlot wants Centre to support relief works

Special Correspondent

JAIPUR: Congress general secretary Ashok Gehlot has asked the Centre to support the relief and rescue operations in the flood-affected districts of Rajasthan. "The State Government's insensitivity and total absence of preparedness to fight the calamity had aggravated the situation in Barmer and Jaisalmer," he charged.

"The situation in the border districts continues to be frightening. The State Government should take all available help from the Army, para-military forces and experts to drain out the water from area at the earliest and simultaneously start locating the bodies and taking stock of the survivors of the deluge in each of the affected villages," said Mr.Gehlot, down with a viral infection, in a statement from Delhi.

"The past fortnight saw excess rain in a dozen districts of the State but the Government did not carry out any substantial relief work anywhere. The devastation and the human misery in these districts are testimony to the Government's failure to act on time. It is clear that the Government had no preparedness. It also did not learn from the experience of the districts which had floods initially," he charged.

Mr. Gehlot said the loss of life and property in Barmer and Jaisalmer districts in the current floods was unprecedented. "If the Government had woken up after the floods in Udaipur division, the rain which took place in the districts of Barmer, Jaisalmer, Pali, Jalore, Sirohi and Jodhpur thereafter would not have inflicted such a severe blow," Mr. Gehlot observed.

"The State Government is not in a position to account for the dead as well as living in the affected districts. The Government machinery has no authentic figures on the number of persons died or those who are missing. According to the local people the figures can be much more than what is being officially given out," he said.

Mr. Gehlot blamed Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje for spending time in "political meetings" in the Capital when the rains started from August 20 in Barmer and Jaisalmer. "The situation finally caught the attention of the Chief Minister only after Governor Pratibha Patil sought a report from the Government," he said.

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