KOCHI: Two years after her husband Babu died, Shybee received a cheque for ₹1.29 lakh in his name, which could prove to be a breather to her perennially cash-strapped three-member family living in a thatched shed.
She was one of the two beneficiaries to receive cheques from District Collector K. Mohammed Y. Safirulla on Wednesday as reimbursement for the money they spent for filling rehabilitation plots on river puramboke at Korampadam in Kothad. The other beneficiary was Filomina.
They had been evicted for road connectivity for the Vallarpadam International Container Transshipment Terminal.
Though the amount was sanctioned long ago, it had got held up in bureaucratic maze ever since. The payment on Wednesday can be attributed to the recent revival of the monitoring committee for the implementation of the rehabilitation package.
“Regular monthly meetings of the monitoring committee will help in the resolution of such long-pending issues. The Collector has made it a point to hold meetings on the third day of every month,” said Francis Kalathungal, general convenor of Moolampilly Coordination Committee.
The late Mr. Babu had spent his life-savings on filling up the marshy plot seven years ago. His was among the five families who were found to be really poor and not able to buy land with the compensation amount. Realising this, then District Collector had given them three cents each of river puramboke.
However, after the Moolampilly rehabilitation package was notified in March 2008, they were given two more cents each.
While three families, out of the five, have already built houses on their plots, Ms. Shybee continues to live in a thatched shed along with her two school-going children.
The plot that belongs to Johnson, who is paralysed, could not be filled as yet since there is no proper road to access it. Public Work Department officials had inspected the plot recently.
