Congress leaders slam Govt for trying to evict slum dwellers, serve memo to MCD

The Uttarakhand Pradesh Congress Committee President Pritam Singh, former MLA Rajkumar, PCC vice president Suryakant Dhasmana and others met the municipal commissioner Vijay Kumar Jogdande and submitted a memorandum against the eviction notices served to slum dwellers. Meanwhile, the Municipal Corporation of Dehradun (MCD) has marked 10700 homes in the slums as encroachments and about 8000 eviction notices have been issued to the occupants so far.

During the protest, PCC chief Pritam Singh said, “The State Government is destroying the lives of the people under the garb of executing the court orders. The members of the Bharatiya Janata Party meeting the slum dwellers are doing nothing but politics. The Congress party will not remain quiet and will make every possible effort in favour of the people. The present Government has done nothing for the slum dwellers and now they are about to demolish their homes which is a very bad step.”

Former MLA Rajkumar said, “We will not let anyone destroy homes in the slums. If any activity is conducted by the MCD under the anti-encroachment drive, then I will be the first person to tackle it. We have submitted a memorandum today, but if nothing is done in two days then we will take out a massive rally on July 28 to the Chief Minister’s residence.”

He said that thousands of people live in slums where irrigation department, MDDA, PWD, MCD and others provided facilities including electricity connection, water connection and collected house tax from the people. Crores have been spent on such works in slums and there is a legal provision to facilitate rehabilitation of slum dwellers so no one has the right to simply demolish it all.”

Talking about the matter municipal commissioner Vijay Kumar Jogdande said, “The MCD will work as per the orders of the High Court. We will continue to issue the eviction notices. About 8000 notices have been issued so far by the corporation team and further process will be undertaken accordingly,” he said.