By Alok Bhatt
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
KARNATAKA, India – Monsoon rains catalyzed the worst flooding India has experienced in over 100 years on Monday. India’s monsoon season annually leaves scores of flood victims dead and displaced, yet it has been decades since flooding as caused such immense destruction and alarm. Between the southern states affected by the torrential rains, flooding has claimed the lives of over 270 victims and displaced more than 2.5 million people.
Rescue workers responded expediently to the news of imminent tragedy. Prior to the most intense flooding, relief organizations began reinforcing the embankments of the Krisha river with over 300,000 heavy sandbags to prevent the floodwater from penetrating the trade-center city of Vijaywada. Rescuers also dropped rations and plastic sheets to the displaced population from helicopters. In Andhra Pradesh, over a quarter-million people have been relocated to makeshift relief shelters. Aid workers in Karnataka were able to move over 450,000 into similar temporary housing.
While the government and relief workers have taken significant initiatives in their rescue mission, the relentless flooding in southern India carries risks and ramifications other than loss of property and life. With so many people placed into temporary shelters, conditions at the shelters prove inadequate and resources scarce. Displaced persons have questioned whether the government could have provided further amenities, but funds for improving the relief camps are currently insufficient. The influx of rescued people into the makeshift shelters over the coming weeks will undoubtedly cause overcrowding issues while the government strains for the money to accommodate the homeless and rebuild the rain-ravaged cities. Also, flooding of travel-ways has made the efficient distribution of already scant resources difficult for the government and aid workers.
Furthermore, aid workers fear the rapid spread of water-borne disease to which hundreds of thousands of people are now vulnerable. India must also bear the significant loss of agriculture, as the monsoon flooding submerged vast acres of corn, sugarcane, paddies, and other crucial crops.
While the Indian government continues to calculate the monetary cost of the damage, relief workers continue to provide food and shelter to the displaced, and the military works continual rescue operations. Though the lack of necessary funds keeps rescued persons in derisory conditions, measures are being taken to secure the lives of the displaced.
For more information, please see:
Al-Jazeera – Millions homeless in India floods – 7 October 2009
CNN – Over 270 killed in India floods – 5 October 2009
Times of India – Flood water recedes, new worries surface – 6 October 2009
Yahoo! News – India floods leave 2.5 million homeless, 250 dead – 5 October 2009
