Recovery for poor will be hardest in Tamil Nadu: NGO

The marginalised communities in the flood-hit areas of Tamil Nadu will find it hardest to recover, an NGO said here on Thursday.

The urban homeless, slum dwellers and fishing and tribal communities in Cuddalore, Thiruvallur, Tuticorin and Chennai need immediate and long term help, ActionAid India said in a statement.

ActionAid said one of its teams was providing immediate relief to at least 6,000 families.

"The priority is to reach the most vulnerable communities - daily wage workers, fishing communities, tribal and Dalit communities along the coast," it said.

"In Chennai, our immediate attention will be to help people who were already homeless, people living in slums and the urban poor."

"These are people who were already vulnerable and surviving on paltry daily wages. They are now without homes and without work. Their recovery will be the hardest," it said.

The statement added that recovery would be a major challenge.

"But the people of Tamil Nadu had shown incredible resilience when faced with a mammoth tsunami a decade ago. It is that spirit that will keep us all going."