When you can't prevent, live with it

When Flood becomes a yearly affair

                                                      Hide and seek / nishal lama ©                                                   

This had to be my first blog post; guess, I wanted it that way. Don't ask me why, for I may not be able to convince you with my answer.

Well, I am a north-easterner (India) from the deepest core of my heart. And I am proud of that very fact. You will find many like me, living in different parts of the country, far away from home. We really don't have a lot to do back home, you know. Do you hate me because I say this? Well, what do I care! This is my space and I, too, have got certain prejudices -- just like many of you -- and here I have got this little space to think, write, photograph, just the way I want. That's precisely why I have this blog. Man, I am glad to have finally found this space. 

Anyways, let me tell you why I say the above -- many will say a poignant -- statement.

I have a masters in Audio Visual Communication. Been a journalist (just to know how frustrating helplessness can be)-turned-photographer. I can go back home and apply for a job, but then I won't be able to justify my work. Many reasons to be blamed. No-no, I am not talking about the senior reporter, or the sub editor, for they are helpless too.

I am from Assam, or at least should I say I have lived almost all my life there -- long enough to call the place my own.

Just like they say, It is NOT what you see, It is How you see it! I feel if you really have to see the real beauty, you get to go to the interiors. So, my sincere advice to somebody going to the North East India would be, try going to the interiors. Like places that you haven't heard of before. Life is not what you see in the city, but beyond.

The photographs below will tell you a similar kind of story. 

There are many like me from Assam who would have heard or seen life in a flood affected area. Well, flood is a yearly affair back in my State and everyone gets to face the music living in the plain areas, you know. Everyone! I was lucky that way, for I come from the one and only hill station of Assam, Haflong. So, speaking about the flood, I always thought that was the end of it. I mean whatever I could see, you know. And I am speaking about Guwahati.

The extent and magnitude of flood problem is assessed in terms of different types of damages caused by flood. And till then I had only seen this in the city, which was only the tip of the iceberg.

The entire North East is connected with rest of the country through Guwahati. The Capital of Assam, Dispur, lies in this city. (How small the region -- North East India sounds like -- right? Well, that doesn't give you the authority to generalize me with the rest from N-E India, for we may look like one, but we are different, as different as chalk and cheese, night and day, black and white.

Flood. I was speaking about that. So, this happened in the year 2007, while I was an intern in Action Aid, Guwahati. I discovered something that I would have never been able to otherwise. 

For the internship, I was assigned the responsibility, along with other members, to develop a brief documentary to capture the impact of flood amongst people living in these flood affected areas in the State. I was all excited about the internship until the day when I actually happened to go for  field work and interact with the people from a small Village at Padimpora Chowk in Nalbari district. Everything happened really fast, you know, and it took quite a bit for me to understand what was going on.

Some revelations from my one-month-long internship in Action Aid:

Nalbari district is one of the most worst affected areas during flood.

During flood, the people didn't have any place to stay and rehabilitation would reach them after long days of wait.

There was no sign of proper sanitation. What's worst, is during flood villagers had to live amidst so many epidemics.  

Not less than 150 kms away from the capital city of Assam, there still is a Village with no electricity at all. I felt miserable to have actually travelled all the way there in an air conditioned car just to see them living life in an oven. And to make the water murkier, half of the village was immersed under flood water. 

There was just one school and the village still has children's wanting to pursue higher studies. Some doctors, and some engineers. Many would leave the village after class X, for they wanted to pursue higher studies.  

Along with usual course, the children's were taught ways to tackle flood situation. 

More than prevention, precautionary measures were given more importance here. Why? Well, flood is a yearly affair in Assam and it has continued for the last five decades. Yet, the appropriate rescue and relief operation never reach the needy on time. 

                    Children playing in the mud after a night of heavy rain / nishal lama ©

During the monsoon, children's often have to travel to school this way / nishal lama ©

As flood water recedes, risk of epidemic looms / nishal lama ©

A group of Children get together while their parents are out in  the fields to catch some fresh fish / nishal lama ©

A child does her assignment in the only existing school in the Village at Padimpora Chowk / nishal lama ©

Every year the floods leave a trail of destruction, washing away villages, submerging paddy fields /

nishal lama ©

An old lady looks at the mighty river Brahamaputra, which has wiped out nearly 4,000 square kilometres of area at a rate of 80 square kilometres per year, destroying more than 2500 villages and affecting more than five million people in Assam /

nishal lama ©

The issues related to floods in  the Brahmaputra are many, which has now become a yearly affair.Ravaging flood enters Assam villages every year and affects lakhs of people.

The floods of 1988 and 1998 of the Brahmaputra basin were unprecedented which completely shattered the economy of the state. Comprehensive studies have been undertaken to go into the various aspects of floods and flood control. Continuous rainfall during in Assam has led to a serious threat with floods. The worst affected are the Villages. Subansiri, Ranganadi, Dikrong, Baginadi, Pabha, Kakoi, Johing and other rivers take dangerous shape with their waters drowning hundreds of villages around.

 

Acknowledgement: 

 

Commits, the college I did my masters in. This internship was part of my academic curriculum

Action Aid, for giving me the opportunity to do my internship

Deepmanjuri and Ananya for helping me speak in the local dialect, and just being around

My second hand film slr for letting me shoot everything I wanted