Concerned over the slow rescue process, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Monday spoke to his Uttarakhand counterpart Vijay Bahuguna over telephone to take early steps for expeditious evacuation of tourists and pilgrims of the State stranded in various locations of the flood and landslide ravaged State.
According to official sources, during his brief conversation, Patnaik requested Bahuguna to take steps to provide relief and necessary assistance to the stranded people from the State and for their safe dispatch to New Delhi. Chief Minister Bahuguna reportedly assured Patnaik that all tourists and pilgrims from Odisha would be taken care of and steps would be taken for their early evacuation. He also advised Patnaik to intimate the names and details of the persons from Odisha trapped at Badrinath and other places, if available, to his office to take necessary steps for their evacuation.
Patnaik asked the Resident Commissioner at the Odisha Bhawan in New Delhi to coordinate with the Uttarakhand authorities continuously on rescue and relief and evacuation of the State pilgrims.
Meanwhile, despite slow process of evacuation by the helicopters due to bad weather, the Resident Commissioner’s office at New Delhi through the three official teams was able to rescue and send 106 more persons from the State. With the rescue of 106 more persons, the total pilgrims who returned home safe went up to 313. According to the Special Relief Commissioner’s office quoting the Resident Commissioner’s office New Delhi, 14 people were sent by air from Delhi to Bhubaneswar on Monday evening.
It said that one IPS officer, five OAS officers and three doctors, including a lady doctor, who had reached Delhi on Sunday, have already been deployed at Haridwar, Dehradun and Rishikesh for better coordination and providing immediate relief to the people expected to come from Badrinath.