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Thomson Reuters

Inept response to floods outrages India

Wed Sep 3, 2008 3:26am EDT

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By Bappa
Majumdar

PURNEA, India, Sept 3 (Reuters) - For several days, Urmi Mahato
and her family were glued to the radio and TV, eager for information on rising
floodwaters and waiting for the government to tell them whether and when to
evacuate their home.

The warning never came, and officials assured there
was no danger. Then one morning a wall of water crumpled the river's mud
embankment, swamping the village and sweeping away her family.

"I do not
know where to look for them, there is no one to help me," said the 24-year-old
woman, sitting at a government relief camp in Bihar, one of India's poorest
states.

The floods have forced more than three million people from their
homes, destroyed 100,000 ha (250,000 acres) of farmland and killed at least 90
people.

Media reports say the toll is at least 10 times higher, after the
Kosi river, which originates in Nepal, burst a dam last month and unleashed the
worst flooding in Bihar in 50 years.

But the tragedy is not entirely
nature's doing. Experts and aid agencies blame government ineptness for not only
failing to warn people but also for mishandling relief.

In the most
shocking example, SOS fax messages sent by engineers at the Kosi dam warning of
impending disaster were ignored in Bihar's capital Patna, the Mail Today
newspaper said.

The faxes piled up on the relevant bureaucrat's desk
because he was on leave and no deputy had been appointed. No one reacted even
when warnings were sent to other officials, the paper said, calling for
prosecutions for criminal negligence.

"We have come across such reports,
and we will definitely look into this issue once all this is over," Nitish
Mishra, the state's disaster management minister, told Reuters in
Bihar.

"There should definitely be some accountability."

Anger is
mounting and stick-wielding victims have resorted to looting food warehouses and
trucks in some areas.

The threat of disease is also rising, but the
government says it could take months before people can return home from
camps.

The monsoon comes every year and also caused severe flooding in
Bihar last year, but authorities admit they were not prepared for the scale of
the disaster.

"Neither us nor the people thought such a devastation could
happen so suddenly," said Mishra.

FAILURE TO THINK AHEAD

But aid
agencies are unimpressed by the speed of the relief effort. Hundreds of
thousands of people are still trapped on rooftops, elevated roads or surrounded
by water in distant villages, without any food or water.

"On the ground,
preparedness is missing in the current response," said ActionAid's P.V.
Unnikrishnan. "Preparedness cannot be a knee-jerk reaction and currently
preparing against disasters is not on the radar of the government."

After
days of delay, India finally stepped up evacuation and relief this week by
deploying 14 more columns of army personnel, while three naval companies were
also asked to help.

More than 560,000 people have been evacuated, and
200,000 have been moved to government relief camps, officials
said.

Environmentalists say the government should have de-silted the
river as Kosi, known as the "river of sorrow" for its ability to quickly change
course, leaves behind heavy silt and debris.

"The floods have pushed
Bihar back to 50 years and authorities should be blamed for a slow response not
the river," said Rameshwar Prasad, a local historian and
environmentalist.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) said
the floods, as well hurricanes in the Atlantic, were reminders of the risks of
ever more extreme weather linked to a changing climate.

Indian experts
agree, saying the government must wake up to the complex issue of climate change
quickly.

"It looks unusual for such heavy rains to hit Nepal and Bihar at
the same time and cause floods so regularly," Sunita Narain, a climate change
expert said in New Delhi.

"We don't have time now, we better get our act
together now and prepare to face disasters tomorrow." (Editing by Simon
Denyer)

© Thomson Reuters 2008 All rights
reserved

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