00:00Losing a home to a landslip is a nightmare Taradat Brijmohan and his family have lived
00:06through not once, not twice, but three times.
00:11In 2020, their three-storey concrete home collapsed, forcing them next door into his
00:16brother's home.
00:17A year later, that home also tumbled.
00:22Both brothers and their families moved across the road to their parents' home, where another
00:27sibling and his wife lived.
00:29But over the last two weeks, that home, too, has dramatically shifted and cracked, forcing
00:35them all to evacuate.
00:37Sometimes when you hear a person commit suicide or something in a village or a community,
00:43a lot will be going through your mind.
00:45What this person do, and the person's wife was unfaithful, and all kind of things.
00:52But this kind of situation, we moved from one house to the other house, my younger brother's
00:56house.
00:57That house went down.
00:58My older brother, my elder brother, my mom and dad also live here.
01:02They gave us a little shelter here.
01:03And now this house, it is not good.
01:06It's a life Taradat says no one should ever have to experience.
01:10He says their home, which fell in 2020, took over 15 years of sacrifice and savings to
01:17build and was lost after living in it for just four years.
01:21His wife, he says, has stood by him in strong support.
01:25But he admits it has not been easy.
01:56Taradat and his brothers believe leaking water pipelines led, over time, to the undermining
02:15and destruction of their properties, and want the Water and Sewage Authority to take responsibility
02:21for what has been happening.
02:23They say reports to the authority led to side visits, even a line repair.
02:28But they've been told torrential rainfall is to blame.
02:31This wasa line, we make report, right?
02:35They wanted to see solid evidence.
02:37They wanted to see water coming up.
02:38They wanted to see the leak, right?
02:40We have that in video.
02:42We have everything.
02:43And, you know, I think somebody, wasa mainly, you know, we should be compensated for that.
02:52To date, none of the brothers has been able to get any real help, and they are now prepared
02:57to take the matter to court if necessary.
03:00For Taradat, a retired Defence Force staff sergeant, he sees this as the state failing
03:06him after giving more than a quarter-century of his life in service.
03:11What keeps him going, he says, is his wife and three children, and the words of his young
03:17daughter.
03:18Every day she mentions, Daddy, when you rebuild the house, I want my own room.
03:31She gives the colour of the room, and I hope, I hope, I hope that maybe, in the near future,
03:41I can give it her.
03:43Cindy Raguba Tikasing, TV6 News.
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