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FLOODS IN BIHAR
The great flood began at the eastern embankment of the barrage in Nepal. Over 3 million people have lost their homes and loved ones as the angry waters of River Kosi inundated more than 16 districts of Bihar. The eastern embankment of the dam near Birpur town breached on the 18th of August but the Bihar government called in the army only 10 days later, on August 28, officers said. In the meanwhile, the National Disaster Response Force was the first to reach the region and begin rescue work.
The Press media which has it office at Patna has been running an eight-member help desk to contribute to the government's relief and rescue operations, and it's been a big success -working as a bridge between the state, donors and victims by communicating requirements and coordinating some relief efforts.
AT LEAST 14 children have been rescued from the clutches of traffickers in the flood ravaged districts of Bihar - a disturbing sign that middlemen are taking advantage of the vulnerable situation of trapped people. Kailash Satyarthi of the Bachpan Bacaho Aandolan (BBA), a child rights organisation, said because of the negligent attitude of the officials and lack of volunteers, the NGO has not been able to save all children from being trafficked.
Most of the children, rescued during the past three days, were seen at railway stations, where the traffickers board the trains along with a children to metros such as Delhi, Kolkata, Punjab, Haryana and Mumbai. "Our volunteers identified 35 children as being trafficked in the Saharsa railway station, one of the districts where the floods have wreaked havoc. However, because of lax attitude of the railway officials and lack of volunteers, 27 of them were still taken away. We could rescue only eight," Mr Satyarthi said.
Similarly, in the Katihar railway station, the BBA volunteers rescued six children. Darbhanga, Bhagalpur, Saharsa, Katihar, Supaul, Madhubani, Sitamarhi, Purnea, Kishanganj and Khagadia are some of the places in Bihar where children are trafficked from. "Most of these children are in the age group of eight to 13 and they are being lured away on the pretext of a better life in the city when the reality is that they are being pushed into roadside eateries and dhabas once they set foot in the metros.
The entire government administration and police are engaged in rescue and relief work, the scandal of child trafficking, which is also another disaster, which is largely ignored.
In two days, the helpdesk received more than 400 calls and saved more than 1,500 lives. But the enormity of the tragedy and the scale of devastation only just emerging, as the water level recedes and people begin to take stock of their tragedies.
Children have been separated from parents, parents from relatives, and people have, in one stroke, lost their life's savings and homes.
To conserve precious batteries in these times, marooned villagers do not listen to songs, or health programmes - all that most hear is the regional news bulletins of All India Radio. The local news should improvise - it should become the vehicle for snippets of crucial information that will save lives -- like boiling water before drinking, how to avoid malaria and precautions with food
Three weeks after the Kosi River changed its course and set off a catastrophe across 1 lakh acres of land, several villages still remained completely cut off and beyond reach, with people desperate and hungry without food and furious.
The currents around Giwaha in Bihar's Supaul district were so strong that rescuers could not access it until Thursday, when Hindustan Times was the first newspaper to reach the remote, submerged area.
When the flood ravaged his area, the man's family had food stored for five days. They survived on it for the next 18 days. On Thursday, they got "chura" - flattened rice flakes) - for many, the first morsels in two days.
The eastern embankment of the dam near Birpur town breached on the 18th of August but the Bihar government called in the army only 10 days later, on August 28, officers said. In the meanwhile, the National Disaster Response Force was the first to reach the region and begin rescue work.
Rescuers scouring many of the 1,000 submerged villages are now being turned away by villagers who say they want to stay back to protect their homes and cattle from thieves.
Even in relief camps, people are desperate to go back as some people from every family are still back home.
About 380 villages in Bihar are trapped between the two embankments of Kosi and around a million people are subject to its onslaughts every year. This time, it just happens that we sat up and noticed.
"A dam won't control the silt-laden waters. Moreover, the catchment below this proposed dam gets good showers and the water from this area will threaten downstream areas," argues Mishra, an IIT Kharagpur civil engineering alumnus.
But despite such devastation wrought by the river every year, Mishra is against calling Kosi Bihar's 'River of Sorrow'. "The British called it so because when Kosi was in spate, revenue collection used to be a problem.
But even they never jacketed it. The local people continue to adore Kosi," he points out.
British administrator Charles Elliot, he says, once said that if there is anything that could be said about the behaviour of Kosi, it is uncertainty. "But our engineers sought a quick-fix solution initiated by their political masters," he laments.
Many would think that Mishra comes from Bihar and that recurrent floods compelled him to take up 'the cause'. He laughs at the notion.
He points out that he's from the 'Abu Salem town', Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh. It was just a coincidence that got him interested in Kosi.
Starting from the scriptures, it includes the legends of Kosi, folklores, history of attempts to tackle floods in India, the efforts and 100-year-old debates to tame the river, the decision-making and construction process, scams and their outcomes and aftermath. It is also littered with voices of people who have been affected by the Kosi and by administrative attempts to 'fix' the Kosi problem.
Before the meeting, one expected to meet someone agitated at the turn of the events brought about by faulty planning. But Mishra, unlike his muse, the Kosi, turns out to be calm, collected and logical - something that is reflected amply in the book he has written.
More than 1,200 people have been given shelter at a relief camp at the Trivenigunj High School in Trivenigunj, where volunteers briskly prepare rice, pulses and vegetables at a langar (community kitchen) 24 hours of the day.
Mothers sit awake the whole night, afraid they might lose their children. But they know much else has already been lost forever.
Thousands of villagers here had been waiting for any government aid for weeks, so angry that one of them assaulted an HT photographer minutes after he landed in the village on an army boat. The man was angry at being photographed, and so weak from hunger that he fell down right after.
"You will not be able to make out how many people have died in this flood, you will not see dead bodies floating around," said an old man at the camp who refused to give his name. "Come when the water recedes, you will see skeletons, and not a few -- I can tell you that."
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