Barh Mukti Abhiyan
6-B Rajiv Nagar. Patna 800024
Bihar , India

Press Release



“If it had not breached at Kusaha, it would have anyway breached at this point,”
points a villager towards the probable location on the eastern bank in village
Rajabaas near Prakashpur in Sunsari district of Nepal, located 14 km upstream of
Kusaha where the Eastern Afflux embankment of the Kosi had breached on the
August 18, 2008.

The river has indeed come close to the embankment at the site and with the spurs
that protect the embankment in no good condition, a potential danger lurks. The
setting is seemingly perfect for another breach! The state has just woken up,
collecting stones for the protection work in case the river decides to gnaw the
embankment. Should that happen, what course the river would adopt before it
joins that Ganga is not known just as it was not known the course last year
following the breach at Kusaha?

So, that’s what the Water Resources Department leaves it during this year to be
reaped (faced) by the Disaster (mis)Management Department of the state. Since
there is no dialogue between the two, the vicious cycle gets perpetuated year
after year.

That is the inference of a team of 15 professionals and social workers that
visited the area hit by last year’s devastating floods of the Kosi during March
21-27, 2009. The team noted that the repair works at Kusaha are far from
complete although the engineers at site claim that they will complete the work
to their ‘entire satisfaction’ by April 20, 2009, eight months after the last
year’s disaster, before fresh water reaches the site following snow-melt in
upper catchment. This claim will have to be verified in days to come.

Everyone hopes that they are not caught on the wrong foot again! The Kosi flood
disaster of 2008 was spread over 5 districts, 35 blocks, 993 villages affecting
33.29 lakh people and spread over an area of 3.68 lakh hectares in India alone
which resulted in loss of nearly 600 persons and destruction of 2.37 lakh
houses. But for the colour of the sand, a vast area of the Kosi basin now
resembles Jaisalmer (Rajasthan) and may need the help of the experts of Central
Arid Zone Research Institute CAZRI, Jodhpur for revival of agriculture in the
region.

That is only one half the story. The other half about which no concern is shown
by anybody (Government and NGOs included) comprises of nearly 1.5 million people
spread over 414 villages trapped between the two embankments of the Kosi which
is the route of the normal river flow in a normal year. “We literally have our
houses on our shoulders and despite using weed or wood fired chulha for cooking,
no cobwebs are seen on our thatched roofs. We have to shift our houses much
before spiders start developing the webs”, says a resident of village Nirmali,
trapped between the two embankments of the Kosi in Supaul district. Their
problem is perennial just as the flow of the river.

The team visited the Bhutahi Balan and the Kamla Balan basins and finally landed
up in the Bagmati where mammoth embankments are being built or repaired. These
are being raised and strengthened to provide a greater degree of protection to
the people living outside them. But from Dheng to Runni Saidpur there is hardly
any reach of the embankment that has not faced the wrath of the river and the
breaches and yet the people and the Government believe that these structures
would protect them from floods.

That silt contained in the river waters is equally responsible for the
devastation that is caused by rising bed level of the rivers and subsequent
failure of the embankments can be seen in the villages of Raksia and Ibrahimpur
of Runnisaidpur block of Sitamarhi district. A 27 feet high mosque in Raksia is
submerged in sand and only top 5 feet is visible above the ground while a temple
of Lord Shiva has to be dug out every year from the sand to offer puja in the
latter. Will the engineers and the politicians ever recognize the secular
behaviour of our rivers?

The team was shocked by the joke that is played in the name of the development
in Kaala Pani area of Runnisaidpur. Nearly 75 squire kilometers of land has been
submerged because the embankments on the Bagmati blocked the entry of the
Manusmara into it and as if that were not sufficient, the unprocessed effluents
from a sugar mill were dumped into the Manusmara to make the submergence black
and stinking. No agriculture is possible with such ‘waters’ and there has been
no crops in the area for the past ten years now. The farmers of Kaala Pani
remain engaged in agriculture, but in Punjab and Haryana.

.

Dinesh Kumar Mishra

27th March 2009


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