The states of the northeast are once again coping with catastrophic floods brought by significantly higher rain than normal in many districts, heaping death and misery on an embattled population. At least 36 people lost their lives in the deluge, and lakhs have been displaced, with the communities in Assam suffering the most, while Mizoram, Manipur, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Tripura also reeled under the impact.
A stark transition occurred in the affected region over the course of just one week, going from deficient rainfall for May to crippling floods. Some were lucky to be rescued, including over 1,670 tourists stranded in north Sikkim after landslides blocked roads; days later, many continue to remain inaccessible.
Three Army jawans too perished in a camp while some were missing. Prime Minister Narendra Modi called up leaders of Assam and Sikkim and the governor of Manipur with a message of central help. For many in the northeast, intense monsoons are a fact of life, notably along the vast Brahmaputra and its tributaries in Assam.
The citizens here are trying to cope with the new normal in the era of an aberrant climate marked by widely varying rainfall. Several areas in Assam recorded rain exceeding the normal by a few hundred per cent, such as Darrang, where the downpour stood at 241 mm against a normal of 17 mm for a single day on June 1.
The course of the monsoon each year is clearly driving home the point that the Union government and the northeastern states must prepare for extremes better.
If the monsoon brings more displacement, lakhs of people in the northeast face the distressing prospect of spending many more days in relief camps, severely affecting employment, children’s education and access to healthcare.
People, naturally, expect governments to respond with alacrity and high capability to address their distress, more so given the robust national economic growth. Safe water, sanitation and access to healthcare are immediate concerns for people. The state disaster management authorities have been improving their capabilities, but systemic weaknesses exist in climate adaptation initiatives.
Here, the Union Department of Science and Technology’s effort to map flood and drought risk at the district level using the framework of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) should help raise the game on adaptation, mobilisation of international climate finance and adaptation measures, including resettling the most vulnerable communities.
Among the recommendations made by the panel is to provide compensation or insurance for flood and drought losses, including for farmers, as a means of community empowerment. Much of Assam will benefit from this, given its particular vulnerability and annual exposure to floods in the Brahmaputra system. So would the other states that are now in the path of extreme weather. Support for ecologically sound housing can reduce a lot of trauma and should be given high priority.
