Every Sunderbans island needs a disaster reduction plan, say experts

Almost a week after cyclone Yaas battered coastal areas of West Bengal and Odisha, there are 17 neighborhood kitchens working at Kumirmari, the distant island within the jap a part of the Sunderbans, bordering Bangladesh. There are nonetheless hundreds of individuals stranded on the island who can’t return to their houses as massive areas stay inundated.

“Through these community kitchens, we are feeding about 5,000 people every day. Embankments have been breached at 16 places on the island and people have not been able to return to their homes,” stated Debasish Mondal, Gram Pradhan of Kumirmari.

On the opposite aspect of the creek lay reserve forest land and the Marichjhapi island, the Pradhan defined, saying that over the previous few days, folks taking shelter on the embankments had heard the roars of a tiger. Kumirmari, because the title implies, refers to human-crocodile battle.

The jap a part of the Sunderbans, surrounded by mangrove forests, with Royal Bengal Tigers on land and crocodiles at sea, is a utterly totally different topography than the western a part of the Sunderbans, which has islands like Sagar, Ghoramara and Mousuni.

“More than 2 km of embankments have been swept away to the southern side and we cannot distinguish between where the land ends and the sea begins. On May 25 and May 26, almost three fourths of the island of Kumirmari was under water,” stated Mr. Mondal. The pradhan stated the island was house to about 20,000 folks. Asked whether or not planting mangroves would save the island, he stated one wanted land to plant mangroves.

Chandrima Sinha, programme supervisor at Nature Environment and Wildlife Society, who has been working for the previous a number of years on conservation-centric livelihoods for the island, insisted that there was no quick-fix resolution to the problems referring to Kumirmari.

“The island is surrounded by three rivers from all sides. The first requirement is to understand the complex hydro-geography of the island. Every year, the earthen embankments are repaired using soil under MGNREGA work, but this is no permanent solution,” stated Ms. Sinha. Like the Gram Pradhan, she too agreed that planting mangroves would take time and there wasn’t adequate land accessible to plant them.

The mixed impact of cyclone Yaas and the total moon tide on May 26 led to the breach of embankments at a number of locations within the Sunderbans.

Experts emphasise that each one the 54 inhabited islands of Sunderbans want a disaster danger reduction plan. The Indian Sunderbans comprise 102 islands of which 44 are inhabited and the remaining are uninhabited.

Tuhin Ghosh, director of the School of Oceanographic Studies, Jadavpur University, stated each island within the Sunderbans archipelago was distinctive. “For having a disaster risk reduction plan, we have to look at the land use, distribution of population, and embankments of the island,” Professor Ghosh identified. He defined that options that labored for one island might not work for an additional. According to experts, plantation of mangroves which may act as a protect towards cyclones might take 5 to 10 years.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday held a assessment assembly on the harm attributable to cyclone Yaas and sought to arrange an skilled committee to make sure that the embankments have been repaired yearly.

“We have to fight nature by nature… In places we are sure that embankments would not hold in the next season, we can try for planting mangroves or other trees that hold the soil,” the Chief Minister stated.

Ms. Banerjee stated the State authorities had planted 5 crore mangrove saplings with the State Environment and Forest Department incurring an expenditure of ₹16.5 crore. The State authorities has estimated harm as a consequence of cyclone Yaas to the extent of ₹20,000 crore. The Chief Minister additionally urged officers to regulate excessive tides on June 11 and June 26, and be sure that the embankments have been repaired earlier than then.