The flood situation in the south Bengal districts, especially in areas of Howrah and Hooghly, remained dire on Friday despite the DVC decreasing the release of water from its dams.
“The Durgapur barrage released only 56,000 cusecs of water from Friday morning, significantly lower compared to the past three days,” said a senior irrigation department official.
The news, however, brought little relief to Safiqul Islam, a farmer who has been surviving in flood-hit Hooghly’s Khanakul by taking shelter on the rooftop of his one-storey house.
“Most of the one-storey houses in my area are underwater. My wife, my two children and I have survived on the rooftop for the past five days, as our house is located on higher ground,” said Safiqul, whose village, Kushali, remained inaccessible for government relief until Thursday.
According to the marginal farmer, he hadn’t seen such a devastating flood in at least 10 years. The water levels rose so high that a two-storey house collapsed in Talit village, 6km from his residence.
A two-storey house in Talit village, part of Khanakul’s Iswarpur gram panchayat, was washed away by the floodwater currents on Tuesday. A video of the house collapsing went viral on social media by Thursday night.
Khanakul I and II blocks in Hooghly are among the areas most affected by the recent floods, caused by the significant release of water from the DVC dams because of heavy rainfall upstream of the Damodar river.
“Khanakul is a lowland and one of the most vulnerable areas in the lower Damodar basin, with at least three large rivers and dozens of canals. The situation worsened when floodwaters entered through the breached embankments of rivers like Rupnarayan and Mundeshwari,” said a senior state government official.
Dingi, small countryboat became the medium of communication in Khanakul area of Hooghly.
Around 22 of the 24 gram panchayats under Khanakul I and II block were submerged, isolating vast areas from the mainland. According to the official, although the DVC reduced the water discharge, it would take at least three days for the floodwaters to recede.
In 2021, the state government had to airlift a few families from Khanakul as floodwaters engulfed the area. However, this time, the situation has worsened, with many new villages submerged after the DVC released 3.5 lakh cusecs of water in a short period.
The situation is similar in Howrah, where 20 gram panchayats in Udayanarayanpur, Amta and Bagnan are also experiencing the devastating effects of the flood caused by the rampant release of water by the DVC.
A few areas in Panskura block, which is on the East Midnapore-West Midnapore border, is witnessing long queues of vehicles, including trucks, as one flank of National Highway-16 that connects Calcutta and Mumbai continues to remain waterlogged.
Sujit Roy, a member of the Panskura panchayat samiti, said that the queue stretched for over 10km between Panskura and Debra as water from an overflowing Kangsabati flooded one side of the highway making it inaccessible to vehicles.
“I have never seen such devastation in the past seven or eight years. Despite our efforts to dredge rivers and reinforce embankments with World Bank funds, the flood wouldn’t have been as severe if the water release had been limited to 1-1.5 lakh cusecs. The large-scale discharge by the DVC worsened the situation,” said Pulok Roy, state PHE and PWD minister and a Trinamool Congress leader in Howrah.
