Bodies of 6 women flown home

Guwahati: Bodies of six women from Guwahati city – Jayashree Bora (60), Rina Das (55), Hema Saikia
(58), Kalpana Adhikari (64), Bhumika Das (60) and Bhanita Deka (55) — who were killed in the earthquake in the Himalayan country were flown to the city this afternoon at the initiative of Government of India.
The women had gone to earthquake-ravaged Kathmandu as part of a 26-member team of pilgrims, from Guwahati on April 23 last. One of her team mate Padma Majumdar has remained untraced till since the  earthquake, state agriculture minister Rakibul Hussain said.
The bodies were handed over to the families of the deceased at the airport after last respect were paid by three ministers of the state –Rakibul Hussain,Dr Bhumidhar Barman and Akon Bora –, state BJP president Siddhartha Bhattacharjya and other senior officials of the government.
Minister Hussain informed that as per the information available with Assam government 141 persons from Assam were there in Nepal on the day the mega earthquake rocked the Himalayan country.
Out of those, he said, six women were killed, three including a woman had gone untraced, nine were undergoing treatment  at hospitals in Nepal, two were in a Delhi hospital while 23 are safe in Nepal. The rest have either returned or are returning to the state on being facilitated by the state government. Union Minister of Sports and Youth Welfare, Sarbananda Sonowal who is an MP from Assam, took firm
initiative to help people from the North East who were stranded in Nepal after the earthquake. The Union minister had deputed two officials from his ministry to Kathmandu for the purpose.
Chief minister  Tarun Gogoi has cut short his visit to Australia and returning to the state on Wednesday in view of the situation arising in the state because of deaths of people from Assam in Nepal earthquake.
Meanwhile, family members of Kalpana Adhikari whose body too arrived along with those of rest five  women killed in Nepal earthquake, did not allow her body to be paid the last respect at the airport under the aegis of the state government to register protest that Assam government did nothing at all to help the family members to trace and arrange for transport of the body.  However, Assam’s minister Rakibul Hussain refrained to react to the allegation at this juncture.