STATE GOVT ILL-PREPARED: AKHILESH

LUCKNOW: Samajwadi Party (SP) national president, Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday alleged that the state government was insensitive and ill-prepared over relief measures even as the cold had turned intense across the state. Akhilesh said because of the extreme cold weather condition more than 100 people had died in the state, people were uncomfortable, poor were shivering in the cold, there’s a crowd of people at hospitals, but the state government of BJP was unaware of all this. He said: “The chief minister’s night trips in Lucknow and Varanasi are just an eyewash to deflect attention. There is no real relief for the people,” said Akhilesh in a press statement issued on Saturday evening.

He said that the intensity of the cold was not reducing, the temperature was falling. “Cows are dying of cold. There is a lack of veterinary doctors in the state and cow shelters have no adequate arrangements,” Yadav said. The former chief minister said: “The government should make arrangements for cold in advance, but the BJP government has made unpardonable negligence this time. The night shelters are in inadequate numbers and they have not enough mattresses and quilts. Reports are coming from all over the state that people are dying of bone-chilling cold. The blankets that the child minister distributed to the inmates at the night shelter near the medical college in Lucknow were taken back from them soon after the CM left the spot.”

Akhilesh said that in winters the government arranged bonfires in all districts, but this time all the districts were devoid of fires. “It is the government’s obligation to make relief arrangements. The government should have a human face,” he said.