Surviving the Darkest PhaseKASHMIR FLOODSALAMGIR AHMAD DARThe recent floods destroyed everything that came in its wayIt has been almost one week since Kashmir’s worst natural calamity inhistory. Flash floods resulting fromslow to extremely intense rainfall starting from south Kashmir area (Kulgam, Anantnag, Pulwama) and progressing in the central Kashmir (Srinagar) and ended at north Kashmir (Sopore, Baramulla, Bandipora) swept away mountainsides, villages and towns,thousands of people, animals, agricultural fields, irrigation canals, domestic water sources, roads, bridges, and buildings – in short, anything that stood in the way.The valley remained disconnected with the rest of the world. Mobile communication, local media, and newspapers, remained dysfunctional. The national media’sfocus on the plight of tourists, highprofiles and bureaucrats caught in the floods has grossly distorted the true nature of the tragedy. It has not reported on the fate of thethousands of poor families living in small mud houses. No one cameto help affected people as they were completely submerged. Somehow some people managed to escape from the flooded area by different means. They narrated the darkest phase of their life in refugee camps. Staying in the refugee camp is not easy. Here you are dependent on others for every basic need. Single bread is shared and living together in smallcamps with 400-500 people can bea frightening experience. This causes more frustrations.The tragedy of the families dependent on manual labor for much of their annual income is compounded by the fact that the season is over for the year, and is unlikely to resume even next year given the destruction of the roads and bridges in the area. Several thousand valley families will now fall below the poverty line. Till therevival of the season, what will be the alternative sources of employment for the newly unemployed? The summer capital of the state which is main control room of the valley was worst hit. The hospitals were submerged for weeks, badly affecting the medical facilities. A lot of patients from farflung areas died as they could not reach the main hospital for treatment. And even if some of them reached, the hospitals were either empty or having inadequatestaff with insufficient treatment requirements. The waterborne diseases were another biggest threat to the area as thousands of animals, birds, microorganisms, and several other species died.Almost entire Srinagar city have been badly affected by the floods in the valley. Despite several numbers of medical teams, health departments and NGO’s assistance to relief flood hit people; the ongoing activities are not enough. In Srinagar relief activities are in place, but due to the lack of proper management and distribution mechanism, the affected people have expressed their dissatisfaction. However, people from unaffected areas came forward to start langars, creating relief and rehabilitation centers on their own with proper planning and management, headed by locals without the interference of the state and central government. They distributed some food, water, milk, medicines, etc. among the affected people.The state politics cannot be sidelined as it was an interesting component of the tragedy. The ruling government watched the scene without showing positive action to help the needy and flood affected people. They were hiding in burrows. The opposition party also couldn’t do anything. The flood hit people are angry about the delayed response of government agencies and all the political class in general. The policymakers now need come up with a comprehensive plan to tackle the problems and needs of poor people who have lost everything inthese floods. Importance should be given to indigenous skills and knowledge to solve local problemsfor sustainable development. The policy makers need to solve the problems faced by poor class among the flood affected and undertake practical and long term steps to ensure their complete rehabilitation.(Alamgir Ahmad Dar is a Ph.D Research Scholar (Chemistry), CSIR-Indian Institute of IntegrativeMedicines, Jammu)
Posted on: Fri, 19 Sep 2014 02:40:04 +0000
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