Gujarat govt's relief work more show, less substance

It is not just the Congress that is contesting Gujarat government’s tall claims of providing aid to pilgrims stranded in Uttarakhand. A Gujarati, who rushed to Uttarakhand to know the whereabouts of his stranded sister and brother-in-law, too has criticised the efforts of the state government, calling it more of a show and less of substance.

“The Gujarat government has, in the name of relief camp, nothing but a table set with some medicine. There is no proper co-ordination. Everyone is going gaga over how much Gujarat is doing but my own experience has been that the other states have silently done a better job than Gujarat. We are more about showmanship rather than doing actual work,” said Bharat Suthar, a resident of the city. 

Suthar, who spent over three days in Dehradun while trying to locate his sister, was of the opinion that states like Maharashtra and West Bengal had a better system in place.  

“All the bus-stations, railway stations, helipads and airports had tables of various states with helpline numbers written in bold letters. In case of Gujarat, no such arrangement was made,” said Suthar. He said that he had a letter from both the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Uttarakhand Congress that identified his sister and her group as flood victims and allowed them access to any train to Ahmedabad.

“Yet, I ignored these letters of help and went to seek aid at the Gujarat government relief camp. There, they put our group in a general compartment with no paper identifying us as flood victims. This effectively meant that the ticket-checkers continued to harass us and others would enter our compartments. We had to stand guard at the gate to prevent others from entering,” said Suthar. He also said that later, at Mehsana, they were harassed by a group of young men and Rapid Action Force (RAF) personnel. 

“All this happened because Gujarat government did not bother to give us proper papers,” said Suthar. According to him, the government had set up the camps late while other states had already started their operations a day after the tragedy.

“Other states already had fully-equipped ambulance with adequate number of doctors. By the time our doctors arrived, it was quite late. Gujarat did not even have any presence at the control room set up by the Uttarakhand government,” said Suthar. On the other hand, the Gujarati resident had all praise for the Uttarakhand government and its efforts.

“They were short of manpower, material and money. But whatever facilities they were lacking in, they made up in efforts. I visited the secretariat and every bureaucrat, including the chief secretary and the chief minister. Everyone did their level best to help me,” said Suthar, who finally managed to return with his sister and her group.