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| Edited By: |Source: DNA |Updated: Jul 28, 2017, 07:54 AM IST
India is battling a scourge of flood. The aggravating flood situation in Gujarat and Rajasthan has led to 100 deaths in the two states. Meanwhile, pockets of Jharkhand, Odisha and Bihar are also reeling under flood-like conditions. In Assam, the situation seems to be improving, but this recovery is 77 lives too late. Besides the loss of life, the damage to India’s infrastructure is massive.
An estimate by the National Disaster Management Authority states that on an average, houses and public infrastructure suffer damage of Rs 1,805 crore per year, while over 75 lakh hectare of agricultural land is damaged. Behind this appalling failure in countering the destruction of life, limb and property is the distressing apathy of the central as well as the state governments. Both, in parts, have let down the common man. Sample this: A CAG report released earlier this month shows that there was an incredible 60-per cent shortfall in the release of central funds to Assam meant for the implementation of flood prevention measures.
State governments have been equally complicit. In at least eight out of the 17 states and Union Territories surveyed by the CAG, the auditor found that Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) on flood prevention measures were done in a haphazard manner that did not adhere to the set guidelines on Flood Management Projects. In many states, there was an inordinate delay in approving the DPRs by the committees concerned. Punjab takes the lead here in setting an egregious example, where the approval of a plan was delayed by 13 years.
However, it is not governmental apathy alone that is to be blamed. Unusual weather patterns caused by drastic land warming has led to this seemingly unmanageable crisis. Last year, nearly 150 events of extremely heavy rainfall, of more than 200 mm each, occurred between June and September, which were essentially concentrated in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, parts of Rajasthan, the Konkan region and western Maharashtra.
The frequency and intensity of such events have risen worryingly. Experts have suggested that with a spike in temperature, the water bearing capacity of the atmosphere increases and more moisture is drawn from the oceans, which, in turn, leads to sudden precipitation. When such events occur in regions where cities abound, they are inevitably beset by a waterlogging problem. However, when rural areas struggle with such events, the mobilisation of rescue operations lags far behind the speed expected. Consequently, casualties follow.
