Two people from the Musahar community have died of cold in the past two weeks in Sarlahi’s Haripur Municipality. Ramesh Majhi, 40, of Pidari, Ward No. 9 and Ram Bhagat Majhi, 65, of Laxmipur Kodraha, Ward No. 6 died of hypothermia in the last fortnight.
Ramesh, who worked as a daily-wage labourer, came home on December 10 after harvesting paddy. Lacking proper bedding, he laid hay down on the floor and fell asleep on it. He never woke up.
Family members rushed him to a health clinic in Padari. The clinic’s manager Assistant Health Worker Dinesh Sah said that Ramesh was already dead by the time he was brought to the clinic.
Ramesh used to live in a two-room house built a few years ago by the Madhes government under its public housing programme. He and the four other members of his family lived in one room while his brother Moti Majhi’s family lived in the other.
According to his neighbour Asha Devi Majhi, Ramesh died because he did not have warm clothes and blankets and worried that many other Musahars could suffer the same fate. “None of us can afford warm quilts or jackets to protect us from the biting cold,” he added.
Bishwonath Rai, chairman of Ward No. 9, said that he had not been informed about Ramesh’s death but assured that the ward was working with non-governmental organisations to distribute blankets to those who could not afford them.
Similarly, Ram Keval Majhi, Ram Bhagat’s son, said his father died of cold on December 9. He used to work as a labourer at a brick kiln in Janakpur and had no money to keep himself warm this winter. According to the families of the deceased, no government or non-government organisation has come to inquire about Ramesh or Ram Bhagat’s death or provide any help.
Police Inspector Bijay Kunwar of the Area Police Office of Haripur told The Rising Nepal that no one had informed the police about the deaths. “When the police are informed, we collect the body and send it for post-mortem procedures. Only then do the families receive the compensation they are entitled to from the Government of Nepal,” he said. Community members and locals say that Ramesh and Ram Bhagat used to drink alcohol too.
Musahars are some of the poorest and most marginalised communities in Nepal and many die of hypothermia and cold-related ailments every year, as they cannot afford warm clothes and heating gadgets.
Source : TRN,
