Monsoon season flooding in Nepal, India and Bangladesh has claimed more than 1,700 lives this season. Water levels are beginning to recede, but many crops have been destroyed, and the Red Cross warns of dangers from diseases. Lekhnath Khatri lives in Jhapa, a village in south-eastern Nepal with an unfortunate characteristic:? It's one of the towns in the country worst affected by this year's monsoon.
A farmer, he says the floodwaters began to rise on August 12, around midnight."As soon as I learned about the floods, I went around telling my neighbours," Khatri said. "They began to rush towards higher ground.
Most took shelter in a local school. More than 200 children, women and old people spent two days without food because everything they had was inundated with floodwaters."
The community finally received some relief from local aid organizations, but Khatri said they still hadn't gotten help from the government, and are struggling to return to their lives."The floods damaged our roads. So that's the main problem we have been facing now,"?Khatri said. The farmer says he also lost all of his rice crops, and his home was destroyed by the water.
"We lost whatever we had to the floods. Our thatched roof home has become uninhabitable. There's mud everywhere inside it; waters damaged our clothes and beddings. Our children have been unable to go to school because roads have been washed away in floods," Khatri said. Monsoon season is part of life from June to September in South Asia. But this summer, the heavy rains have claimed more than 1,700 lives, in the worst flooding the region has seen in years.
Save the Children said Thursday in a press release that at least 18,000 schools have been damaged or destroyed by the flooding throughout South Asia. "We know that the longer children are out of school following a disaster like this, the less likely it is that they'll ever return," Save the Children's general manager in India's Bihar state, Rafay Hussain, said. "That's why it's so important that education is properly funded in this response, to get children back to the classroom as soon as it's safe to do so and to safeguard their futures."
The north-eastern state of Bihar is the worst affected part of India. According to official figures, 514 people have died there. West India also experienced severe weather: the metropolis Mumbai was forced to a standstill on Tuesday due to flooding. Dibya Raj Poudel, head of communication at the Nepal Red Cross Society, is distributing supplies in Jhapa, the Nepali village where Khatri, the farmer, lives.
"This village is populated by indigenous people and the so-called untouchable Dalit people, who have suffered the most," Poudel said. "They used to live near the river because most were landless, and that was the only area where they could build a home. But they were vulnerable to the disaster. In one hamlet, all of its 45 houses were damaged in floods." Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina visited the flood-hit districts twice in the past few weeks, assuring them of every possible support her government can manage.
"The flood-affected people will get food aid for the next three months until the next harvest," she told a gathering in Gaibandha district on Saturday while distributing relief goods among the victims. She also promised rebuilding for those who lost their homes, seedlings for the farmers whose seedbeds were washed away and medical support those who are ailing. She also urged the microcredit lenders not to press the poor farmers to repay the loan instalments for the next three months.
Tayebur Rahman, a farmer in Kurigram district, said water levels have decreased remarkably, but that only means the destruction is now visible. The International Red Cross warns that there could still be outbreaks of dangerous diseases in the floods' aftermath as the water recedes. "The situation is very difficult now. Without the government's assistance, it seems impossible to overcome the havoc that the flood had wrecked in the area," Rahman told dpa by phone.
Comments
Comments are closed.