Nepal Pays Rs 45,000 Each to 4,108 Bhotekoshi Flood Families, Malaysia Gives Rs 150m

The government paid Rs 45,000 each to 4,108 households hit by the Bhotekoshi flood in Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading, the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers said on Wednesday, October 14. The money, funded by the World Food Programme, moved through a single window system built to stop any family from being paid twice, the PMO said.

The cash reached families in 11 local units, five in Rasuwa, four in Nuwakot and two in Dhading, the PMO said. The Red Cross and other groups have also offered cash help, so the government told local units to coordinate under the 2024 Disaster-Sensitive Social Security and Relief Distribution Standards to avoid duplicate payouts. If your family is among the roughly 1,400 households in Rasuwa, Nuwakot or Dhading still waiting for data checks, the government plans to pay you within three days, the PMO said. Rs 45,000 is about $300.

This week, Malaysia's Foreign Minister, Datuk Seri Utama Haji Mohamad bin Haji Hasan, handed over a cheque for more than Rs 150 million, about $1 million, for Bhotekoshi reconstruction, OnlineKhabar English reported. Mudita Bajracharya, whom OnlineKhabar English named as acting head of mission, received it for Nepal's Prime Minister's Natural Disaster Relief Fund. More than 50 Malaysian citizens remain out of contact since the flood, the outlet reported.

In Nuwakot's Bidur municipality, the Nepal Trade Union Federation, GEFONT, handed 18 temporary homes to flood hit families from Rasuwa who came looking for safer ground, DC Nepal reported. KP Sharma Oli, former prime minister and chair of Nepal's CPN-UML party, attended the handover and said resettlement must be the first priority, DC Nepal reported.

Separately, a measles rubella vaccination drive planned for flood hit Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading has been halted because health officials cannot pin down where displaced children now live. The flood scattered about 35,000 children, OnlineKhabar's headline said. Its report puts the preliminary estimate at 34,000 children aged six months to 15 years who need the vaccine in the affected local units of Rasuwa and Nuwakot alone. Families have scattered from flood holding centres to relatives' homes or temporary shelters, and Dr Abhiyan Gautam, chief of the immunization section at the Family Welfare Division, told OnlineKhabar that officials cannot say which communities to send vaccine teams to. The drive, planned to start after Dashain, is part of a wider campaign covering an estimated 75,000 children across all flood hit districts, OnlineKhabar reported. No measles cases have appeared in the flood zone yet, Gautam said, though clinics are watching for suspected cases.

What the coverage missed

Republica's report of the PMO statement does not mention a legal gap that, until this week, kept families of the Bhotekoshi flood's missing from registering deaths, which the Kathmandu Post reported also blocked claims for relief, compensation and insurance. Local governments in Rasuwa and Nuwakot said they could not certify deaths without recovered bodies, because Nepal's Civil Code generally presumes a missing person dead only after 12 years, with shorter periods and a court route for disasters, the Kathmandu Post and OnlineKhabar English reported. Families who performed funeral rites with kusha grass effigies found ward offices could not register the deaths, OnlineKhabar English reported. The government introduced a new procedure to declare Bhotekoshi victims legally dead only this week, approved by the executive committee of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority, Nepal's disaster agency. It requires a self declaration, a local public notice and committee verification, with police involved only when no family member lives in the missing person's household, OnlineKhabar English reported. It came about seven weeks after the flood.

What we still do not know

• How many families have used the new procedure to register a missing relative as dead, and how many have then received relief. The Ministry of Home Affairs or district disaster committees in Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading could answer.
• How much of the Prime Minister's Natural Disaster Relief Fund, which now also holds Malaysia's contribution, has reached flood victims so far. The Ministry of Finance or the Prime Minister's Office could answer.