Flood

Floods does it ring any bell to you, not much to me, as I have never been affected by it. What it means to me is that I can go to the two wheeler bridge (near deccan gymkhana in pune) and see some water in river mutha, a reason to get a holiday from office or college. But every year I hear and read news that in many parts of India, in particular parts of Assam, Bihar gets affected by flood. Then the usual news, that minister’s and political leaders, doing aerial visit to access the damage. Then deciding on, how much money to ask for relief work. Blame game starts the state government blaming center for not providing enough assistance and all.

This time the flood came and I did not hear much news in our news channel. As we had more pressing news like punishment of Sanjay Dutt and nuclear bill etc. But I read a report on BBC and it said that that it is the worst flood which affected millions.

As I belong to Bihar so I got more interested in the plight of people out there and some thoughts crossed my mind. One of the worst affected districts is Dharbhanga. It is on the bank of river Ganga. When I was a kid I used to hear talks that all Ganpariya (the people who stay on other side of Ganga , people who stay in Dharbhanga) know swimming. Reason being, that every year flood comes in that part of the state, so people by default learn swimming. I am sure that this is not a nice reason to learn something, and human beings will definitely learn something to save their life.

Every year flood comes and what does the government which
the people of this part vote do for them? Somehow I feel the officials and politicians wait for the flood. For them it is a time when they get huge amount of fund to spend. When the fund gets allocated there is a chance for them to take a cut. Floods come, people die, and politicians do aerial survey and stunts like landing the helicopter on road to gain cheap publicity ( Lalu did it this time). Lot of funds are released a fraction of that is used to provide assistance to the needy. More attention is given to issues like whom to give contract for procurement of material (given to people close to politicians) then how to distribute it to people.

Millions of people are forced to stay away for days form their home, many fall sick because of various diseases that spread like malaria, dengue and other water born diseases. They are forced to eat snails and rats to survive. People fight with each other to get the little amount of food which comes for distribution.

And then when the rains are over and rivers take the normal course these people go back to start their life once again. These poor affected people get busy in re-constructing there house trying to bring their life to normal, taking loans to survive and start their lives once again. Officials and politicians also become busy in calculating the amount they earned, Opposition parties raising the issue of corruption and how the things was not handled properly and by the time winter comes ( nov, dec) this issue is closed and they start looking at new things.

This story is repeated year after year and people now say...

"It happens every year. There is nothing new in it. This is our destiny"

Rajkumari Devi(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6937267.stm)

I wonder why after nearly 60 years of independence this issue has not been addressed in Bihar
and other states. Every one knows there, that every year floods come, then why no action? Why we are more reactive and not proactive? Why don’t we take steps so that such situation does not arise? What we are doing is feeding a young man for a night instead of teaching him how to earn his own bread?

Will all this change,hope it does ...