TDP brings another batch by chartered flight

• Returnees rue official apathy
• Chandrababu Naidu's gesture hailed
• Happy reunion with families
• Ongole woman irked over military personnel indifference

Hyderabad: Another batch of 105 pilgrims airlifted by the Telugu Desam Party from Uttarakhand arrived here in a special Spice Jet aircraft at 8 pm on Thursday. Some of the volunteers of the NTR Trust, whose services were drafted by the party for the relief operations taken up in Uttarakhand, also returned along with them. In all 26 of them left for Visakhapatnam in the same aircraft. Buses were engaged to send pilgrims who reached the city to their respective places by road.

The pilgrims resented the official apathy that left them in the lurch for more than a week in Uttarakhand. There is a sort of discrimination against the Telugu people, they complained. 'Even the Army jawans proved to be no exception, but it is something unheard of. We had to wait for the last turn for everything including a bottle of water', they said.

Some 196 members reached the State on Monday last. Another batch of 44 was sent to the State by providing them with air tickets two days ago. In addition to this 210 people came here during the past two days. The facilities at the relief camps were also not up to the mark. Despite the odds, everyone helped us in return to the state safely, they quipped.

It would have taken another week for us to reach the state, but for the initiative of the TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu, said a woman while heaving a sigh of relief after alighting at Shamshabad airport. She was overwhelmed with joy after finding her family members to receive her. She was one among the pilgrims stranded at Dehradun for the past five days. Another pilgrim claimed that many of those stranded with him in the flood-ravaged Uttarakhand survived on rotten bread slices.

He pointed that many of the stranded pilgrims were reached out by the governments of the respective state and they were all airlifted by chartering special flights within the first two or three days. But the plight of the pilgrims from Andhra Pradesh proved to be different. An aged woman from Ongole said she was held up at Gangotri for over a week. Though approached the Military camp for help, she found nothing forthcoming.

TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu who arrived with the pilgrims in the same flight refused to comment on the relief works. He said he will hold a press conference on Friday and speak on the issue.