Declare Wayanad landslide as a national calamity and speed up relief measures, demands CPI

CPI demands national calamity status for Wayanad landslide, sends relief material, and calls for judicial probe into land scams.

Communist Party of India (CPI) has demanded that the Central government declares the Wayanad landslide as a ‘national calamity’ and speeds up relief and rehabilitation measures given its gravity.

The party’s national secretary K. Narayana flagged off a truck containing relief material, such as rice bags, clothes, and more, to be distributed to the disaster victims at the party office here on Friday, while announcing that he will stay in Wayanad for the next two days to oversee distribution.

Terming the landslide as unfortunate, he said that the onus of reaching out to the victims and offering them aid was on the Union government. He further alleged that the BJP-led Centre was adopting a ‘discriminatory approach’ towards the Left-ruled Kerala even during such a grave humanitarian crisis. “Prime Minister Narendra Modi is clearly in favour of the BJP-ruled states and is adopting a different yardstick for the non-BJP States,” he added.

Reacting to the complaints filed by the public against former Minister and YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) strongman Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy, the CPI leader demanded a judicial probe into the land scams in which Mr. Reddy allegedly was involved.

“Only a judicial inquiry will expose the corrupt deals, land scams and financial irregularities in which the Peddireddi family is involved,” he said, while appealing to the victims to file police complaints against the injustice meted out to them.