Suffering Grows in India as Floods Spread

Written by Stephanie Kriner, Staff Writer,
The death toll from India's second major bout of flooding rose to 162 in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh on Thursday (Aug. 31) - even as water levels in the main Godavari River receded below the danger point. The worst flooding to hit the state in nearly 50 years followed catastrophic monsoon rains in northern and northeastern India, Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh that killed hundreds and left millions homeless.

The latest flooding, which arrived last week, also destroyed property and crops worth 7.7 billion rupees ($168 million). Brought on by monsoon downpours, the floods affected 3,112 villages, left tens of thousands homeless and submerged more than 300,000 hectares of farmland. Roads were washed away and bridges submerged, forcing rescuers to use helicopters to drop emergency supplies and pluck stranded villagers from rooftops.

The Godavari, which threatened even more flooding when it nearly burst its banks Tuesday, was running 5 feet below the danger level of 53 feet on Thursday. It was expected to drop to 45 feet by Friday morning. But meteorologists, predicting rain over the next 48 hours, warned that more flooding still could be on the way.

The situation is aggravated by the fact that whole neighborhoods were built in the waterbed of hundreds of dried up lakes, according to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. So while some people are returning to their homes, entire communities remain submerged in these low-lying areas.

Meanwhile, in northern India tens of thousands of people remain in government camps and stranded along embankments overlooking their villages.

In many places, floodwaters have begun to recede, but most people still can not return home. Sri Apatinath is from a village that lies along a tributary of the infamous Brahmaputra River. The tributary, swelled by torrential monsoon rains, burst through an embankment, inundating Apatinath's village and transforming it into a sprawling lake of muddy water. Now the villagers are living along an embankment, under thatched grass or corrugated tin shelters held up by bamboo posts. Some have tarps draped over their makeshift dwellings, others make due with the leaky roofs.

Most of the flood-affected populations living along the tributaries of India's largest river are victims of land erosion. Every year the monsoon season's torrential rains raise water levels, forcing rivers over their shores and against surrounding embankments. The roiling waters eat away the land, a precious resource in this overpopulated country. Sometimes the erosion will force the waterways to change course, and rivers and tributaries will begin to flow over areas where villages once stood.

That could be the case with portions of the village of Ketekibari, but it is too soon to tell. Each day Apatinath and her neighbors wait for the waters to recede, praying that they will be able to reclaim their land and livelihoods. Not only is their village under water, their rice paddies are buried beneath two feet of sand. The soil is ruined beyond repair, according to some of the villagers. Others say that, at the very least, it will be months before another crop can be planted.

The American Red Cross will provide Ketekibari and other villages in Assam with relief supplies to help 5,000 families left homeless by the floods. Two relief flights into the flood-stricken state of Assam will carry relief packages containing cooking oil, cooking utensils, pots and banks, blankets, plastic sheeting and clothing.

Indians Cope with Annual Floods

Floods are a way of life for the people living along the river systems of the Brahmaputra and Ganges. Each monsoon season, the rivers and their tributaries flood, and each year people try to cope by shifting their homes to a higher ground and planting new crops to make up for lost harvests. But the southwestern monsoon arrived early this year. Reports of flooding in north and northeastern India started coming in late June.

The situation turned into a major disaster at the beginning of August when flash floods resulting from heavy rains in the Himalayas swept south, causing breaches in the embankments of the Brahmaputra and Ganges and their tributaries, inundating the surrounding areas.

The magnitude of this year's flooding proved to be too much for the states of Assam, West Bengal, Bihar, Arunachal Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh. Local infrastructure was badly damaged, leaving thousands of villages marooned with no access to relief or medical assistance. By the first week of August, Indian authorities called for international attention to the disaster.

Despite the severity of this year's floods, VanSant, part of an American Red Cross assessment team in the country, was happy to see a sign of life going on as usual. Perched on an embankment above a flooded village was a bamboo structure filled with schoolchildren. Earlier, she had witnessed their school full of mud. "It was great to see the students still doing their letters and math. Even in the face of such a devastating disaster, these people have managed to cope and go on."

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