MP Pooja Chaudhary Demands Alternative Arrangements for Squatter Settlements Before Eviction

Kathmandu. CPN (UML) MP Pooja Chaudhary has demanded that the government make alternative arrangements for the squatter settlements before removing them. Speaking in the National Assembly meeting on Thursday, she drew the government's attention to the extremely disorganized and difficult situation of squatters in the Kathmandu Valley.

MP Chaudhary said that due to the lack of proper management when squatter settlements were demolished, the food, drinking water, and especially the education of children of the landless have been affected. She mentioned that after the settlements were removed, children and parents were forced to live in separate places, and the issue of them going to school also became uncertain.

Speaking in the meeting, she said, 'The condition of the squatters is chaotic, and there is no good arrangement for food, nor any good arrangement for drinking water. Children are staying somewhere, and parents are somewhere else. There is still uncertainty about when they will go to school. I want to urge the government that the remaining squatters should be properly managed and then demolished.'

She has also urged the government not to cause further suffering to the landless in the name of solving the squatter problem. Her argument is that demolishing settlements without guaranteeing shelter and ensuring basic needs is not just.