38,000 in relief camps,most not yet ready to return home

According to district magistrates of Muzaffarnagar and Shamli,3,500 families comprising over 23,000 members in Muzaffarnagar and 3,000 families consisting of over 15,000 persons are staying in camps in Shamli.

Muzaffarnagar DM Kaushal Raj Sharma said,“These families belong to those villages where the rioters torched the houses and damaged religious structures on September 7 and 8. They fled their houses to escape the attack.”

There are three relief camps where about 1,000 persons of one community have taken shelter while about 3,200 families of another community are staying in another 22 camps,he said.

“None of these families are ready to go back to their villages and it will take over a month to build confidence among them. We will start escorting them to their houses after a week to make them comfortable with the situation,” said Sharma.

He added that the government has schemes to renovate houses of riot victims and also for religious structures.

As per the official records,houses were set on fire at Laank,Bahawadi,Mundbhar and Kutba villages,which are under Phugana police station of Muzaffarnagar,but belong to Shamli district. The religious structures in these villages were also damaged.

The rioters had forcibly evacuated the houses before setting these on fire and had spared the families on a condition that they will never return to the villages.

While the administration is yet to begin a survey of houses torched in the violence,the inspection of these villages by senior police officials has so far found over 1,000 houses were set on fire.

Shamli DM Praveen Kumar Singh said that they are running 14 relief camps where they are providing foodgrains,milk and water to the families.