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Kathmandu, April 19
Hundreds of people, who were stranded at Tribhuvan Park in Thankot were transported to their hometowns.
They left for their hometowns at around midnight with the support of local leaders.
More than 300 people working in Sindhupalchowk, Solukhumbu and Dolakha districts were stranded in the park following the nationwide lockdown.
They were kept in the park at the initiative of lawmakers from the area.
Most of them were from the western part of the country.
Federal lawmaker Aanjana Bisankhe and provincial lawmaker Rama Aale Magar of the area had helped them get shelter inside the park.
They had also managed food for the stranded people with the support of local leaders.
Some of them had been staying in the park for the last 20 days.
Meanwhile, the local government in the area had asked the lawmakers to make arrangements to take them to their destinations.
They had also expressed the fear that keeping stranded people in the park for long could turn the place into a new hot-spot for COVID-19 inside Kathmandu valley.
The lawmakers duo have thus managed eight buses to take them to their destinations — Bardiya, Kailali, Dang, Nepalgunj and Sarlahi.
Lawmaker Ale Magar said, &We had to frequently request the home minister and various district administration offices for travel pass, and finally after obtaining travel pass we managed the buses to take them to their homes.&
The Supreme Court had also recently asked the government to safely transport stranded poor people to their hometowns.
Daily wage earners and the poor have been walking for days to reach their homes after the nationwide lockdown was extended.
With the transportation of those needy people, additional 300 people have arrived in the place today, according to Ale Magar.
&This can spell trouble since we have not officially started transporting people from here.
We are only helping those who have travelled for days to reach the place, and we will continue to do so,& Ale Magar said.
Meanwhile, more than 100 people have been given permission to take shelter inside Tribhuvan Park, with the support of lawmakers.
A version of this article appears in e-paper on April 20, 2020, of The Himalayan Times. The post Stranded people taken to their hometowns appeared first on The Himalayan Times.
