501 homeless die due to heat, board disagrees

New Delhi: The Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (Dusib) berated at a data given by Centre for Holistic Development (CHD), which stated 501 homeless people in national capital died in June 2018 due to extreme heat.

This data is procured from Zonal Integrated Police Network (Zipnet), Union ministry of home affairs, and was tabulated by Sunil Kumar Aledia director, Centre for Holistic Development (CHD).

Mr Aledia said while the government charts out “winter action plans” and recovery plans, there is no “summer plan”.

The government needs to do better planning to help the homeless during summer months, he said.

The data has sent shockwaves as this is the second time in the past 15 years where the numbers of homesless deaths have crossed 500 during the summer.  In June 2018, 501 people lost their lives in Delhi;  this number was as low as 268 in June last year and 317 in 2016.

Overall, according to the data, the maximum deaths took place during this summer when the heat was unbearable.

If in the past 15 years, 3,267 and 3,817 people lost their lives in April and May, respectively, the number went up to 4,784 in June.

A total of 1,751 people have lost lives in 2018 so far, while 2,979 people lost their lives in 2017 and 2,249 in 2004. While the numbers keep fluctuating every year, experts say that many records are likely tumble this year.

Where is the shelter provided to them through the day and night and people are willing to go inside,

B.K. Rai, a Dusib expert lashed out at the findings, saying  “There is no basis for the data How can someone claim that all the deaths are connected with the heat problem. Give evidence.”

 There is no concrete evidence about th deaths. The data is about an unidentified body in Delhi, which doesn’t imply that all were homeless. The Delhi police doesn’t conduct autopsy on every unidentified body, so until a post mortem is conducted one cannot ascertain the cause of death, therefore how can they claim all deaths were due to shelter or heat problem, Rai added.

As per data, out of these deaths, 80 per cent were homeless. This number is almost twice the number of 2017 and the highest in the past five years.