Patna: Panicked villagers in Bihar are fleeing for safer ground with their belongings and livestock after the state government on Saturday issued a high alert cautioning them about imminent floods in several northern districts.
Millions of villagers settled in these parts of Bihar have always been affected by disasters.
The warning was issued after massive landslides caused by heavy rainfall blocked the course of the river Kosi in Nepal. The landslides have claimed eight lives and trapped a huge number of people, as per reports.
The government says the water level may go up and affect people settled in the three districts of Supaul, Madhubani and Saharsa.
“We have been informed by the government of Nepal that the Kosi river stream has been blocked owing to massive rainfall and landslides there. We apprehend the Kosi may flow 10 feet higher than normal time as a result of this which will affect a massive population,” Bihar’s disaster management department’s special secretary Anirudh Kumar said in a press statement to the media on Saturday evening.
He appealed to the masses to flee for safer ground as soon as possible and take shelter in relief camps being set up by the state government. The government has also appealed to the neighbouring population to help evacuate people who could land in possible danger.
Kumar directed the local district administrations concerned to launch massive drives to evacuate the settled population and bring them to the relief camps so that they would not get trapped. The government has already deployed rescue teams to start relief and rescue operations.
Water Resources Minister Vijay Kumar Chaudhary said the landslide in the upper reaches of Kosi, around 100 kilometres beyond Kathmandu, blocked the main course of the entire river. Water is fast accumulating there forming a massive water body.
“According to our information the Nepal Army is preparing to blast the blockage,” he said, adding, “We do not know the exact volume of water and are trying to estimate it. But a huge quantity of water is sure to be released after the blast. It may also spill beyond the Kosi and its embankments causing floods.”
The development has, once again, revived fears of a repeat of the 2008 Kosi disaster when the river changed its course flowing through more than 2,000 densely-populated villagers in five northern Bihar districts after it breached its mud embankment at Kushaha in Nepal.
More than 1,000 villagers were killed and over five million were affected for months. The incident also brought wide-scale destruction of agriculture land spread over some 800,000 acres that got filled with sand, making the land completely barren.
Meanwhile, the Water Resources Department officials held an emergency meeting on Saturday to discuss the situation arising about of blockage of Kosi caused by landslides. They also discussed the increasing water retaining capacity at Birpur barrage over Kosi on the Indo-Nepal border through sluice gate operations. Normal water flow takes five to six hours to reach Birpur from there. Authorities said all WRD officials have been called on duty.
