By Manas Dasgupta

GANDHINAGAR, MARCH 9. Gujarat is facing the twin problems of earthquake rehabilitation and acute water scarcity. The Chief Minister, Mr. Keshubhai Patel, is under tremendous pressure due the burden placed on the State's exchequer by the disastrous earthquake and the third consecutive drought.

Even as the State was looking to the Centre for assistance to meet the severe drought conditions for which it had prepared a Rs. 1,800 crore master plan, the January 26 earthquake has thrown all the calculations haywire.

Although the State is yet to assess the total funds it would require for the rehabilitation, since it is yet to decide on the rehabilitation package for the four worst-hit towns in Kutch district, the experts put the reconstruction programme at more than Rs. 10,000 crores. The State has also suffered Rs. 21,000 crores damage to public and private property, besides the production loss in industrial as well as agricultural sectors.

The reconstruction of the earthquake-affected areas excluding the worst-hit towns of Bhuj, Bhachau,

Anjar and Rapar itself has been put at Rs. 4,000 crores. Re- location of the towns, as being advocated by the bureaucrats and supported by the Chief Minister in view of the time and energy clearing debris, would involve further increase the reconstruction cost for providing social infrastructure for Rs. 2,000 crores in the new townships.

About Rs. 1,000 crores would go down the drain as administrative cost for the reconstruction programme.

The State Government has prepared a Rs. 1,000-crore industrial package for assisting the industries affected by the earthquake while the agricultural sector would require another Rs. 750 crores for rehabilitation.

The sectoral damage including Rs. 150 crores loss to the railways, Rs. 100 crores to the Telecommunication Department, Rs. 100 crores to the Kandla Port Trust. A similar loss to the Indian Farmers Fertilizers' Cooperative and several other major industrial units, however, would be borne by the departments concerned.

Pulling down buildings

With the authorities still undecided on pulling down the ``dangerous buildings'' in Ahmedabad which suffered severe damage, the High Court has appointed a seven-member committee to decide the fate of the buildings.

This follows the State Government's pleader submitting a list of 21 buildings on behalf of the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation categorised by the Centre for Environment Planning and Technology, which was appointed the nodal agency by the Government to inspect the damaged buildings, as severely damaged.

The centre, however, had left the decision to the authorities concerned whether such buildings should be demolished or re- occupied after carrying out necessary repairs.

A division bench comprising the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice D. M. Dharmadhikari, and Mr. Justice P. B. Majmudar, has asked the committee to submit its report by March 29 when the next hearing on a set of public interest litigations would be taken up.

The order was passed even as the shop owners of the partly- collapsed Mansi Complex and residents of the nearby buildings went on a relay hunger strike demanding demolition of the building.