Bihar Floods: Money is flooding, but is the help too?

It has been an overwhelming response this time, and not just from the general public but even from the governments and politicians individually. Talk about Madhya Pradesh, the state government has extended a help of Rs 5 crore, West Bengal has pooled in with Rs 2 crore and 10 speed boats. Delhi Congress MLAs and Councillors are donating their one-month’s salaries. But the whole challenge is that with so much money pouring in, what are we eventually going to do with this it? And, is it money, which is going to help at this point in time? Right now saying even this much is becoming difficult that setting some parameters for correcting our ill deeds is the requirement or something else is there which we need to trickle and tackle.

The situation in Bihar is worst than just being flood hit. People affected by this horrific flood are getting tortured in many other ways. Those who have been little stronger in terms of the muscle power or even in terms of the financial status have acquired the government provided boats apart from the private ones and are misusing them in and out. It has become a business in disguise for them. They carry trapped people from the areas of flood to a safe location for some good price. It is an open price there, ranging from Rs 500 to Rs 1,000 per trip to safety.

With status quo prevailing in the flood hit areas of Bihar, the theft has reached at its peak….the boat rowers get into the houses under floodwater and fetch out the belongings left behind by the fleeing people, and the irony is that these same belongings are further sold off, probably to same people, who are the original owners. Situation is sad and grim and there is nothing, not even money which would work out in a situation like this. Rescue operation is proving out to be only way to help them out but process is too slow to see any relief soon.

Approximately six lakh people have been evacuated but still 25 lakh people remain to be trapped. Running water is the only breather that people have from this flood, because it keeps epidemic diseases off the bank. But, once water starts receding, an epidemic is only inevitable. Administration had better start thinking about this aspect of Bihar flood as well.

Number of discussions on the issue says that we must have a strong treaty with Nepal to address this issue, but how many really know that more than this treaty we need to curb our own system and administration. It was just couple of months back when the delegation from India went to check the state of the Barah Dam. This trip to the dam is a routine check, which is carried on every year between the months of April-June to see if it is in a perfect shape. And, this time around June, a delegation of engineers and expers visited the dam. But they did not submit any report regarding the bad condition of the dam and just couple of months later this disaster happened and we are not yet able to figure out how to come out of this grave state.

Looking into a situation like this, what is even more unfortunate is there are no penalities, no actions that can be taken towards this team which goes for a survey. The things are always lose at our ends but we somehow always blame it on our neighbours.

Musings