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News From Indian News Paper
Worst floods in 50 years
By Shib Shankar Chatterjee
The Statesman
July 19, 2003
THE chief minister of Assam, Tarun Gogoi, calls it the worst flood in 50
years. Twenty-three of the 25 districts are under the attack of high water,
especially from the Brahmaputra and numerous tributaries, although news from
across the state speaks of widespread relief now that the initial wave of
floods appears to be receding. Incessant monsoon rains and overflowing
rivers have overwhelmed dykes and embankments and easily topped banks.
Several districts of western and eastern Assam were cut off from the rest of
India and not less than three million people were displaced by high water.
Over 7,000 villages have been hit, with widespread damage to property and
crops reported — over half a million hectares of cropland was completely
damaged. Among the worst-hit are the districts of Dhemaji and Dhubri in the
Brahmaputra Valley and Hailakandi in the Barak Valley. The Army has been
called out in some areas to help the local administration.
At least 26 persons were swept away by floodwaters, eight in a boat tragedy
in Sonitpur district and 18 when an embankment gave away in Morigaon
district. Tens of thousands of people have taken shelter on the nearest
highland, the embankments. Numerous villages still face a threat of erosion
from furious currents.
Tarun Gogoi has ordered all districts to speed up relief measures, but there
are shortages of essential commodities coupled with an acute shortage of
drinking water and health care. Water-borne diseases like gastroenteritis,
dysentery, jaundice, typhoid and malaria have killed more than 75 persons.
The toll is expected to rise with the lack of access to drinking water and
sanitation.
Majuli, one of the largest river islands in the world, located on the
Brahmaputra and a UNESCO heritage site, has been flooded and hit by erosion.
Wildlife too has suffered: recently, two rhinos were found dead on the
fringes of Kaziranga National Park, their horns sawn off by poachers, while
two elephants were killed in neighbouring Meghalaya. The surging waters of
the Brahmaputra river have already inundated more than 450 square kilometres
or about 70-75 per cent of Kaziranga, forcing animals to take shelter on the
National Highway and on high ground in the Karbi Anglong Hills.
Although these are among the worst floods in memory, the region faces the
wrath of nature every monsoon, year after year. Devastating floods have
become analogous with summer, disrupting normal life for months.
Conversations these days often turns to the possibility of a permanent
solution and even to the idea of river-linking which is being assiduously
promoted by the Centre as a manna for all flood-related and water-related
problems.
But a question arises: how can the region’s excess water be exported to
another region, effectively a river basin transfer, when the second region
is facing floods? And if the idea is to take water from water-rich areas to
water-deficient ones in the dry season, then the “river linkers” seem to
forget a basic fact: there’s a draft problem and a water shortage even in
these so called “water-rich regions” in the winter.
Better flood forecasting, better drinking water facilities, larger and
better fleets of boats at the village and town levels and dredging the
rivers are more practical solutions than a gargantuan effort costing over Rs
5,00,000 crore. Dredging may be expensive but it is far, far cheaper than
the river-linking mirage.
(The author is a journalist based in Assam.)
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