Assam Floods Trigger Huge Crisis For Villages Crippled By COVID-19

More than 16 lakh individuals are affected by the Assam floods.

Guwahati:

For 55-year-old Abdul Kaizuddin in Assam’s Barpeta district, floods are nothing new. This yr, nonetheless, compounded by the coronavirus disaster, the floods haven been particularly exacting on the vegetable vendor and his household of eight within the Kanchanpur village of Baghbar space, 130 km west of Guwahati. Warned concerning the COVID-19 outbreak, he didn’t enterprise out of his village and now his final hope – a discipline of standing crops – is all beneath water.

“We have faced many floods, but this time the situation is hard for us. We have not seen such huge volumes of flood waters before. Our lives have been totally disturbed,” Abdul advised NDTV.

The state of his household echoes throughout Baghbar on this wave of floods in Assam. Like in previous, the poor and the marginalised in rural areas are struggling the worst. Their livelihood was hit in these areas due to the COVID-19 lockdown and so they survived on greens and grains they produced. Now, all that has been washed away.

On Thursday, the flood scenario remained unchanged. 2,053 villages in 22 districts of Assam are inundated. Over 16 lakh individuals are affected. More than 12,000 of them are in 163 reduction camps. Over 72,000 hectares pf cropland is beneath floodwater. The variety of deaths within the floods has gone as much as 34 with yet one more demise on Thursday.

Meanwhile in Baghbar, 35-year-old Fakruddion rows the NDTV group to his home utterly inundated by flood water. He is a fisherman and has a household of 4 to feed. Even with the flood waters rising, he doesn’t wish to go to a reduction camp for the concern of coronavirus.

“The flood has come amid lockdown. This has crippled us. How can we go to relief camp amid this coronavirus scare?” requested Fakruddin.

The native MLA Sherman Ali Ahmed is busy travelling to the inside stretches distributing flood reduction together with meals and grain.

“Floods are nothing new and this time this area is among the worst hit. But it came at a time when we were learning to live with COVID-19. We have been making people aware, training people on COVID. Now we have to deal with the floods and try to see how both can be handled hand in hand,” mentioned Mr Ahmed.

Since the independence, the Brahmaputra River has eroded over 2,000 villages, round 1.30 lakh households in Assam have been left homeless over a long time of cycles of floods and erosion.

“COVID-19 pandemic has hit us badly since we are labourers. No one could venture out for work. Children are getting only one meal a day and now the floods… We don’t know if we will survive,” mentioned one other flood sufferer Samiruddin.