Shimla, Jul 18 (PTI) Former Himachal Pradesh chief minister Jai Ram Thakur on Tuesday urged the state government to speed up road clearance operations in apple and other fruit-growing areas to save the growers from losses.

Expressing concern over the closure of roads due to rains and landslides, Thakur said farmers are worried that their produce would not reach the markets and rot in the orchards.

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Even after 10 days of the calamity, relief has not reached many places and people are facing great hardship due to lack of water, power, communication and medical facilities, he said in a statement here.

Thakur said that only providing relief is not sufficient and the government must take up rehabilitation work on a war footing and the BJP is with the government in this task.

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Meanwhile, the chief spokesman of the state BJP Randhir Sharma criticised the government for not taking all the political parties along and for not convening an all-party meeting so far.

Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, Deputy Chief Minister Mukesh Agnihotri and Congress state chief Pratibha Singh are visiting the affected areas separately and the lack of coordination is clearly visible, he told media persons here.

The government has pegged the loss at Rs 8,000 crore while the exact loss is yet to be computed, he added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)