Wayanad: Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, along with his sister and Wayanad MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, is scheduled to visit Wayanad later this month to lay the foundation stone for 100 houses promised to survivors of last year’s devastating landslide.
The project stems from a commitment Rahul Gandhi made in August 2024, following the disaster that struck in July that year—one of the worst in Wayanad’s recent history. The landslide decimated four villages, claimed over 280 lives, left nearly 80 missing, and displaced over 8,000 people who were moved to relief camps. Around 6,000 were rescued from the affected areas.
The Gandhi siblings had visited the region on August 1, 2024, shortly after the tragedy, to meet with survivors, assess the damage, and hold discussions with local leaders and administrators. It was during this visit that Rahul Gandhi pledged to build 100 homes for those who had lost everything.
Since then, the Kerala government has earmarked land for the housing initiative, and the upcoming visit will formally inaugurate construction through the foundation stone-laying ceremony.
During his 2024 visit, Rahul Gandhi had drawn an emotional comparison between the collective grief of the survivors and his own experience of personal loss. “I know what I felt when my father died. But this is much worse – people here have lost entire families. It’s not one person feeling this pain, it’s thousands,” he had said, recalling the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.
Rahul Gandhi, who represented Wayanad in the previous term, vacated the seat to retain Raebareli, the family’s traditional stronghold in Uttar Pradesh. In the subsequent by-election, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra won the Wayanad seat by a record margin of over four lakh votes, marking her debut in Parliament.
(inputs from IANS)