Kottayam: Foregoing their holiday, nearly 100 revenue officials at the local Taluk Office clocked in on their day off to fast-track the verification and data entry of flood-relief applications. The taluk had received aid applications from 28,000 families whose homes were inundated in the recent floods.

While relief funds have already been disbursed to 8,000 applicants, yesterday's special drive focused on screening and processing the remaining backlog. With paperwork cleared for an additional 10,000 applicants, they are set to receive an interim relief of ₹10,000 each shortly.

Officials noted that the rest of the applications will also be expedited. Tahsildar Cyril Sanju George explained that the routine office rush on regular working days had made it nearly impossible to focus on data entry.

"We processed the first batch of 8,000 applications by burning the midnight oil after regular hours. When the sheer volume of pending files made it clear that wouldn't be enough, we decided to open the office on a holiday to get the job done," he said.

The special drive was spearheaded by Additional District Magistrate (ADM) Soly Antony, Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) Niju Kurian, Disaster Management Deputy Tahsildar N R Rajesh, and Headquarters Deputy Tahsildar K Y Shameem.