Our daughter is our treasure; don’t require your compensation

Team Udayavani, May 31, 2018, 4:30 PM IST

Padubidri: “Don’t need compensation cheque. I want my younger sister. Bring her back..!” pleaded the child Nisha with the district commissioner.

All those who had come to give support to the deceased family were shocked to her the words uttered by the vehemently weeping Nisha who lost younger sister Nidhi to the force of the flowing flood water while returning back from the school on Tuesday.

Udupi DC visited the house of Nidhi and as she was handing over the cheque of 4 lakh rupees compensation from the natural calamity fund to Umesh Acharya, father of the deceased, when Nisha, who survived from drowning in the flowing water started weeping bitterly. Remembering their daughter, the mother Asha Acharya, Umesh were inconsolably sad which also melted the district commissioner’s heart.

Joint operation

Local youth along with National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) team of 1 PSI and 10 staff conducted a joint operation and finally located the mortal remains of Nidhi in the flood waters at morning 8:15am.

The NRDF team arrived at Padubidri in the morning to help in locating Nidhi and PSI Satish took them to the tragedy location. The team which arrived with state-of-the-art equipment started the operation in the morning at 7am with assistance from the localities. During this operation, Mannohar, a youth from Padebettu was successful in locating the mortal remains of Nidhi at a distance of 50 meters form the incident spot.

Daughters were the support

Umesh Acharya’s family is a middle class family. Both the daughters were his support. Umesh was working as a goldsmith and since the business had reduced he started working as an assistant cook with his elder brother. The mother Asha is an employee at an ayurvedic industry in Padubidri. Just two years back they had bought this land at Padebettu, built a house and were residing here with their daughters.

The inconsolable family

After the post-mortem, the mother being unable to see the mortal remains of her daughter lying on the floor shifted her on to the sofa. The mother’s heart was not ready to let go of her daughter for final rites. She placed a packet of biscuits on her body. At that moment, the grandmother bitterly wept and said, “I too will go give my granddaughter… Who will prepare and give congee to her tomorrow.” The last rites of the child were conducted at Kanchinadka Hindu Rudrabhoomi in Padubidri.

The children were going on a cycle

Every day the children used to go by cycle, park the cycle near a garage and then attend the school. The route they travelled through was a low lying area and when they were returning back from the school, the area was inundated due to incessant rains. As the children were getting washed away by the flood water, a woman from a nearby house witnessed it and raised the alarm. At that time, Satish Shetty who is a localite came running to the scene and was successfully is saving Nisha. Before he could react and save Nidhi, her location was lost. .

Unscientific work

The people complain that the unscientific construction of Muttalive Bridge that connects Hejmady-Padubidri and the construction work of the bridge along the fisheries road connecting Yermal-Kalsanka is the reason this tragedy has occurred.

On Tuesday, as the flood water was increasing, the road was cut open with the help of a JCB and the water from the river bank was let out to connect with the sea. Due to this, the flood water had receded. Currently, Navayuga Construction Company which is carrying the Yermal-Kalsanka work must remove the mud they dumped on Yermal river.