Other States - Orissa   

Working women's hostels turn into offices

BHUBANESWAR: Working women in at least four districts in Orissa have ‘inadequate' facilities for accommodation, though hostels have been constructed for them.

The reason is district collectorate office at Khurda is functioning in one of the hostels while the facility for women at Bhawanipatna in Kalahandi district has been rented out to the District Telecom Office.

At Olatpur in Cuttack, the hostel is used for accommodating patients and their attendants of the National Institute of Rehabilitation Training and Research (NIRTAR) and in western Orissa town of Sambalpur, the DRC has been functioning since 2003.Moreover, the whereabouts of at least four working women's hostels were not known to Women and Child Development department. Another four hostels are yet to be completed. A total 832 inmates are residing in different hostels against combined seat strength of 1351.

Status

The facts came to the light when WCD Department recently started an exercise to know the status of working women hostels in the State ostensibly to avail benefits of the proposed Central government-assisted programme.

In a letter written all Collectors, Director of Social Welfare Sujata R. Karthikeyan said, “at least four working women's hostels have been used for the purpose other than which it was constructed. It is desired that the hostel buildings be vacated forthwith with alternative arrangement of accommodating the institutions running therein.”

At Khurda, Bhubaneswar Development Authority had built a hostel for working women. When contacted Khurda district Collector Hrushikesh Tripathy said, “I don't have any idea about the collectorate building. After all it is a government building.”

According to Ms. Karthikeyan's communication to district collectors, the Union government has recently proposed for a financial assistance for construction of the hostel building on public land only along with the grant for maintenance of hostels.

The WCD Department prepared a four-point action plan to avail the Central assistance. One of plans is to take over possession of the hostels back where it is being utilised for other purposes.

The State government wanted to place a proposal with Union government before second week of April. The WCD department asked field-level functionaries to give exact position of working women's hostels in their respective districts.

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