Victims of the floods in West Bengal complain about insufficient relief supplies

Flood-affected refugees from Amta in Howrah district of West Bengal complain of a shortage of essential relief items in the shelter homes amid floods in South Bengal due to the sudden release of water from the Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) dams.

Since this week, low-lying agricultural lands, roads and residential villages in the catchment areas of the Damodar basin have been completely submerged in several districts of the state, including Purba and Paschim Bardhaman, Purba and Paschim Medinipur, Birbhum, Bankura, Howrah and Hugli.

According to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, the floods are a direct result of an “unprecedented, unplanned and unilateral release” of huge volumes of water from the Maithon and Panchet dams operated by the DVC. She described the floods as “man-made” and announced that her government would sever ties with the DVC. On Thursday evening, the West Bengal government also sealed its border with Jharkhand due to rising water levels in the Damodar basin.

However, the Central government claimed that the West Bengal government was previously informed about the water release by DVC.

In Amta Block 2, the government estimates that over 120,000 people have been affected by a sudden flood of the Damodar River and the connecting canal; a total of 5,000 people have been left homeless and have sought refuge in makeshift flood relief centres.

“We got biscuits, about 150 grams chidwa [poha or flattened rice]50 grams of sugar and some milk every day as a relief. We give that to our children, but for adults it is not enough,” said 50-year-old Purnima Karmakar.

Since Wednesday, Ms Karmakar has found shelter in Jaypur Fakirdas Institution, a local secondary school in Jaypur village (Amta), which has been converted into a flood shelter.

“We have cooked the few vegetables and rations we could bring from home, but that will not last long. We don’t know what we will eat in the next few days,” she said, adding that vegetable prices in the local market have increased since the flood.

She recalled the fateful night when water entered her house in the middle of the night a few days ago. “I was sleeping, it was about 2 a.m. Suddenly I realized that water was entering the house. The sound and the current were terrifying,” she recalled.

Ms Karmakar’s single-storey house is completely submerged. As a single mother, she could only take her children, food supplies, gas cylinders, utensils and a few clothes. “All my belongings have been washed away. This is worse than the DVC flood in 2017,” she said.

At the flood centre, Ms Karmakar shares the same classroom with two other families. “In total, about 20 people were accommodated in this one classroom, while other families with much fewer members were given their own rooms here,” she said. “Even during such a disaster, help is conditional and based on relationships with important people,” she claimed.

Geeta Mali, another refugee at the school that has been converted into a flood shelter, expresses similar concerns. “I don’t think I will be able to return home in the next few weeks. But I don’t know how long my vegetables will last,” she says. Like everyone else, the biscuits and poha she is being offered as aid would not be enough to feed her entire family.

On Saturday, she cooked lunch for the nine people who lived with her in the classroom while her husband looked after the house. “The water in our house is at least waist-deep. How much could we have saved when the flood came with such force?” she asked.

She added that this flood is worse than the last one. “This time my skin is very itchy and scarred after being exposed to the flood water,” she said.

According to senior government officials, 21 flood shelters have been constructed in Amta Block 2. However, most of these shelters can only be reached by boat as the floods have also inundated the access roads.

“Those who lost their agricultural produce due to the flood can recover their losses through the government’s crop insurance program,” said a government official. “But until then, we are distributing sugar, chidwaCookies, milk and water packets to everyone regularly.”

A rice farmer in his 60s, who asked to remain anonymous, said flood relief had only reached selected groups of victims, while people like him received little help for their problems. “I received absolutely nothing from the government, but those who received help received a lot,” he said.

He lives in Thalia, Amta Block 1. He and his family have moved into the terrace of his house as the ground floor was completely flooded. To reach the village centre and the market place, he has to spend Rs 20 to be transported across the floods in a boat.

“All my farmland is under water. My crops are destroyed,” he said. His paddy fields, spread over three bighas, have suffered a loss of around Rs 30,000 crore after the floods destroyed his entire crop. The farmer added that while the water level of the river has gone down, waterlogging in villages has increased.