THAT SINKING FEELING

When the swirling waters started engulfing Teliapokhar village in Bihar8217;s Darbhanga district after incessant rains, two men hurried towards the safety of National Highway 57 linking Muzaffarpur with Darbhanga. Reaching the elevated road, they pulled their four buffaloes up the embankment on to the macadam and waited for their wives and children as they waded through waist-deep water to reach them.
Once safe, their buffaloes tethered nearby, they craned their necks to look at the marooned village they had left behind. Through the hazy curtain of monsoon moisture, they could not see their huts. Nor could they see their mother, 70-year-old Samudree, huddled in a ramshackle kuccha hut.
The frail, old widow had been left behind to fend for herself. 8220;Saving the buffaloes was first on my sons8217; priority as the animals sustain the family. Moreover I have reached a ripe age and nobody will grieve for me should I die,8221; said Samudree, her voice matter of fact, bereft of any desperation or anger.
But this is what a deluge does to villagers: desperation makes them practical. Travel to Ammadih village and you would realise that the calamity is often seen merely as a question of numbers. Out of the thousand-odd people living in Ammadih, a little over 50 per cent rushed to find safe ground. The rest remained behind, braving the waters and the uncertainty they brought. Floods that return year after year have taught the villagers the arithmetic of survival8212;they know how many of them actually need to leave the village, how many can remain behind and yet be safe.
Ramkrit Sahni8217;s case is an example. The illiterate farmer is not a math wizard, but his calculations are impeccable. 8220;It is not possible to transport all our belongings to safety. I stayed back with my wife and children to take care of things,8221; he says. 8220;My three brothers went ahead with their families and their livestock.8221; There is a safe roof that will do nicely for just the five of them and he reckons that he will be able to take care of his family with what is left in their hutment until the waters subside.
It wasn8217;t easy, however, for those who stayed put at their villages. They saw the water collecting in their fields and then rising almost perceptibly and flowing into their homes. They saw the houses at the outer fringe of Ammadih village collapsing one after another under the impact of the currents.
Huddled under tattered polythene sheets on the roofs of Ammadih8217;s two school buildings, men, women and children looked around vacantly. They had little to do and all the time to think about their miseries. Others perched on some raised bamboo platforms in the village and many others stoically made do in water that rose to their waists.
8220;This time it was bad as the rains did not stop for over a week. Despite having foodgrains we were unable to cook and so went hungry for a couple of days,8221; said Jugal Sahni, whose house was swept away by the floods. People here recalled that they had faced a similar situation in 2004, when the rains had been as unmerciful.
Today, Ammadih has the look of a mystical island arising out of the dank, grey landscape that is Bihar during the monsoons. It is among the worst hit by the devastating floods. But the people, laid low by nature year after year, are accepting of their fate. Oh well, it8217;s the time of the year, they shrug. This time, it was worse than normal and no government agency warned them, but they knew. 8220;The last two years were not too bad. This year we knew that it was not going to be easy and we were ready,8221; said Supari Sahni with rustic nonchalance.
In any case, the extremely backward caste residents of the village know they have to survive on their own wits. Despite recurrent annual floods, the state Government has not been able to come up with a fool-proof plan8212;neither to prevent the submerging of essential infrastructure nor to streamline the distribution of relief material.
After the infamous scam of 2004, the Nitish Kumar Government has decided to decentralise relief and rehabiliation. The Patna district magistrate is no longer the nodal point for relief like then. Instead, funds for relief measures have been given to each DM of flood-prone district. But change seems to go so far and no more. The DMs bought polythene sheets, foodgrains and other material but ignored other vital details that could have speedily brought relief. Over one crore people in 19 districts in Bihar have been affected by the flooding, over 200 have lost their lives.
Yet even essential items, like boats, were left out of the planning process. Manoj Srivastava, who is in charge of relief measures, said on Thursday, days after the people became marooned, 8220;There is an acute shortage of boats and we are trying to ferry boats from south Bihar districts to the flood-affected north.8221; That, of course, sounds familiar8212;the Indian bureaucracy closing the door after the horse has bolted.
To add to the administration8217;s chagrin, local boatmen have refused to ply their boats on Government service for the administration8217;s sheer inefficiency in meeting exigencies. 8220;We are yet to receive payment for our services during last year8217;s floods,8221; says one.
And despite claims about advance preparedness, the Disaster Management Department watched helplessly as one area after another was submerged. The most glaring example of its failure was the construction of 8220;raised platforms8221; undertaken across all districts susceptible to floods. The idea was to construct a concrete platform in every block of a flood-prone district so that when road links were cut off a helicopter could land with relief material. The platforms could also double up as shelter for the flood displaced.
Indeed, with much fanfare, 37 such platforms were constructed in Darbhanga, around Rs 22 lakh expended on their erection. But when the crunch time came, the platforms made a laughing stock of the Government8217;s intention. Having been built without a thought to geography, the platforms, to the last one of them, were submerged in the recent floods and singularly defeated the purpose for which they were meant. The official reaction? Nitish Kumar, who learnt of this travesty on a visit to Darbhanga, has directed the commissioner to hold an inquiry into it.
The new relief structure with the DM in the crucial seat also suffers a glaring fault. With roadways under water and virtually no boats at hand, the district adminstrations could sorely do with a helping hand from the Indian Air Force. True, the IAF is deploying choppers for relief work, but the DMs say the permission for the use of armed forces craft has to come from Patna.
So no one was surprised that till Thursday no government official had come visiting at Ammadih or Teliapokhar though the water had begun to recede. Two government boats had finally begun plying8212;people had perched themselves on the national highway since July 208212;enabling those on the embankment to visit their village and fetch essential supplies they had kept there. When heavy rains lashed the area in mid-July, the people had procured polythene sheets and packed wheat, maize, pulses and fodder for their livestock and hoisted the precious caches to safe places, like the roof of the only concrete structure in the village8212;the school.

Back on the Muzaffarpur-Darbhanga NH 57, which has turned into an impromptu refugee camp, human beings and animals shared the polythene sheets held up by sticks that passed off poorly as shelters. Children, unmindful of the risks, waded into the swirling neck-deep waters to pluck leaves from trees to feed the buffaloes and goats. 8220;Mother is looking after my newly born sister. She told me to get leaves for the goats otherwise they will die and we will suffer a huge loss,8221; said Sunila, who talks and acts way beyond her 11 years.
These milch animals are assets for these devasted families and they do everything to protect them from the waters. Most of the people are illiterate sharecroppers and the milk they sell adds that extra rupee to their meagre incomes. No wonder, the men on the highway fret over their buffaloes and cows. Widowed mothers and frail fathers are, in a show of desperate pragmatism, not in their thoughts.
8220;We will go to Barauni, around 60 km away, by train, to bring fodder for the animals since everything has been submerged here,8221; said Bhano Sahni, who has been living on the highway embankment near Hayaghat for the past fortnight.
And yet, the fury of the monsoons brings with it, ironically, the promise of some joy in lives that are desperately poor. This comes in the form of relief materials distributed, however desultorily, by the Government and aid agencies. The 25 kg of rice or wheat and the Rs 200 in cash that each flood-affected family is entitled to represents a windfall, perhaps the biggest amount of money these wretched families will see at any one time during the year. The Government8217;s announcement of compensation for loss or damage to houses and animals is, of course, a bonus.
For government officials and contractors too, the destructive waters are a welcome diversion. They cover up the corruption in construction work undertaken under various government schemes in the region. If road or embankment falls apart for lack of proper construction, it is blamed on the flood. And when funds are allotted for their repair once a post-poll survey is done, there arises another opportunity to siphon off public monies.
Some people will make a small fortune, perhaps erect a two-storey concrete house in a flood-proof locality. Most others, of course, will await resignedly for next year8217;s rains8212;and a replay of their distressing exodus to National Highway 57.