The Hindu Business Line : ‘Cultivable areas in Sunderbans rendered unsuitable for growing crops’

Water woes
An estimated 102 villages in the eastern belts of the Sunderbans, 48 of which are inhabited, have been flooded.
The death toll has already crossed 150 and the figure, it is feared, might rise further.

Our Bureau

Kolkata, May 31 Cultivable areas in the Sunderbans have been rendered unsuitable for growing any crop in years to come by heavy deposition of salt in the aftermath of the recent cyclone Aila and the subsequent flood, according to NGOs working in the area.

Limited quantities of paddy, potato and chilli were grown in the desalinated fields in the estuarine belt. “Some farmers started cultivation only recently; but all their efforts will go in vain at least for the next couple of years,” Ms Ajanta Dey, Project Director, Nature Environment and Wildlife Society (NEWS), told Business Line here on Saturday.

According to Mr Dasarathi Singh, Regional Manager of the Agriculture Insurance Company of India Ltd, most farmers in the area were not covered under the Centre’s National Agricultural Insurance Scheme and therefore might not receive any compensation for the probable loss. The insurance scheme is provided as a compulsory cover to all loanee farmers; however, very few in the region take crop loans from the banks.

“What needs to be done immediately in the area is to repair the embankments destroyed in the cyclone,” Ms Dey said, pointing out that the restructuring work needed to be initiated before the next full moon when the water levels would start to rise. Nearly 30 per cent of the 3600-km stretch of embankment in the area has been destroyed.

An estimated 102 villages in the eastern belts of the Sunderbans, 48 of which are inhabited, have been flooded. The death toll has already crossed 150 and the figure, it is feared, might rise further. “Most villages like Sonargaon, Dayapur, Satjelia, Lahiripur, Samsernagar have been washed out in the flood and the villagers are left with nothing,” Mr Biswajit Roy Chowdhury, Secretary, NEWS said.

The pace of relief work needed to be expedited, he said pointing out that large amounts of medicines, bleaching powder, carbolic acid, tents and food must be rushed to the affected areas.

In addition to building specialised disaster management units for the cyclone-prone areas, the State Government, he emphasised, must train the villagers in community-based risk management to cope with probable calamities in future.

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