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Ten lakh still marooned, wait for aid in Jajpur
Threatened by hunger and waterborne diseases at least ten lakh flood-affected villagers of Bari, Dasarathapur, Badachana, Korei, Dharmasala and Binjharpur blocks of Jajpur remain desperate for aid as floods didn’t recede even after a week.
The helicopter triggers pandemonium on the marooned areas, a cluster of mud houses poking over the surface of the village Ratnagiri on Wednesday. Villagers scramble towards the aircraft, arms aloft in supplication and eyes scrunched against the tornado whipped up by the rotor blades. Rope beds fly through the air, small children are blown to the ground. Yet they keep coming.
A man hefts bags of relief aid from the chopper door. If the villagers are lucky one may land in their arms. But sometimes the bags are flimsily packed and explode on impact with the ground, or the aid tumbles into the water. Either way, seconds later the chopper is gone, skimming over the water towards the next marooned village. It may not return for days. These images of desperation were common in the flood in both the districts. The emergency continues.
The crisis is most severe in Bari and Dasarathapur blocks. Here, a vast ocean dotted with small village-islands stretches to the horizon. Most are still inhabited. In Bangara village under Bari block, a couple of dozen teenagers and their fathers stand guard over their mud-walled homes. In Rathasahi village under Madhusudanpur Gram Pachayat in Bari block, 80 year- old Janakiballava Rath refused to leave the village as no body helped her paralysed wife Rangalata to move out from the marooned area.
Conditions for the marooned villagers are miserable. Green, putrid water laps against the walls of Babaji Padhirai in village Kantipur under Bari block. The men complain of being bitten by swarms of mosquitoes that rise from the festering ponds. “We didn’t have mosquitoes here before,” said Manas Jena , a burly 40-year-old of village Singhpur. “Even the relatively well-off ones are queuing for food.
In the worst-hit areas little can be done until the water recedes. Nobody is sure how long that will take. There are several variables – the land is lower than the river, a thick layer of floodwater silt is preventing drainage”, said Jagabandhu Jena, a retired teacher of Bari.
Sarada Swain in her 40s, was looking upset while being brought out with an eight-member family from her inundated house in village Bari Mount by a boat.
The helicopter triggers pandemonium on the marooned areas, a cluster of mud houses poking over the surface of the village Ratnagiri on Wednesday. Villagers scramble towards the aircraft, arms aloft in supplication and eyes scrunched against the tornado whipped up by the rotor blades. Rope beds fly through the air, small children are blown to the ground. Yet they keep coming.
A man hefts bags of relief aid from the chopper door. If the villagers are lucky one may land in their arms. But sometimes the bags are flimsily packed and explode on impact with the ground, or the aid tumbles into the water. Either way, seconds later the chopper is gone, skimming over the water towards the next marooned village. It may not return for days. These images of desperation were common in the flood in both the districts. The emergency continues.
The crisis is most severe in Bari and Dasarathapur blocks. Here, a vast ocean dotted with small village-islands stretches to the horizon. Most are still inhabited. In Bangara village under Bari block, a couple of dozen teenagers and their fathers stand guard over their mud-walled homes. In Rathasahi village under Madhusudanpur Gram Pachayat in Bari block, 80 year- old Janakiballava Rath refused to leave the village as no body helped her paralysed wife Rangalata to move out from the marooned area.
Conditions for the marooned villagers are miserable. Green, putrid water laps against the walls of Babaji Padhirai in village Kantipur under Bari block. The men complain of being bitten by swarms of mosquitoes that rise from the festering ponds. “We didn’t have mosquitoes here before,” said Manas Jena , a burly 40-year-old of village Singhpur. “Even the relatively well-off ones are queuing for food.
In the worst-hit areas little can be done until the water recedes. Nobody is sure how long that will take. There are several variables – the land is lower than the river, a thick layer of floodwater silt is preventing drainage”, said Jagabandhu Jena, a retired teacher of Bari.
Sarada Swain in her 40s, was looking upset while being brought out with an eight-member family from her inundated house in village Bari Mount by a boat.
