2008 Indian floods

2008 Indian floods

Duration 3 July 2008 - September 2008
Fatalities 2400+
Areas affected
Assam
[1]

Bihar
Maharashtra
Andhra Pradesh
West Bengal
Orissa
Uttar Pradesh
The 2008 Indian floods were a series of floods in various states of India during the 2008
monsoon season. The floods mostly affected the western regions of Maharashtra state and
Andhra Pradesh as well as northern Bihar. In India, the monsoon season generally lasts from
June to September.
[2]

According to Ministry of Home Affairs (India)'s disaster management unit, the countrywide
death toll from floods in various states was 2,404 between June to September.
[3]


Early monsoon
Earlier, during the start of the monsoon season, West Bengal and Orissa were hit with heavy
rains, creating a flood-like situation in the two states. The monsoon killed 100 people, mostly in
the country's east and north-east.
[2]
In Andhra Pradesh alone, 42 people died in a matter of two
days because of sudden, heavy rains.
[4]

August flooding
In August, the Konkan region of Maharashtra experienced heavy monsoon rains, placing lives in
jeopardy. Many inter-city trains between Mumbai and Pune were cancelled. Heavy waterlogging
had been reported from Chiplun, Rajapur, Khed and Mahad in Maharashtra. On 10 August 2008,
a major landslide caused extensive damage to a three-story building at the Sinhgad Technical
Education Society's (STES) academic campus in Lonavla.
[5]
A large number of passengers were
reportedly stranded at various railway stations across western Maharashtra as Central Railways
canceled many trains. Vehicular traffic on the Mumbai-Pune expressway was also affected due
to heavy rainfall and was diverted.
[6]

In Mumbai, heavy rains lashed the city and its suburbs, affecting traffic and disrupting rail
services on the days of 1011 August.
[7]

In Andhra Pradesh 119 relief camps were set up in the state, most of them in the Guntur and
Krishna districts. Hyderabad, Krishna district, and the East and West Godavari districts were the
worst affected areas due to floods. The situation in Andhra Pradesh was more deadly as 53
people reportedly died due to floods.
[8]
In Hyderabad alone 14 people were killed, when they
were crushed by the collapsing roofs of their homes.
[2]

Bihar
Main article: 2008 Bihar flood


Kosi river flood was the worst hit flood of India in 2008
The nexus of the Bihar flood is the Kosi River's immense alluvial fan, extending some 185 km
from the river's exit from the Himalayas and foothills in Nepal, down to its confluence with the
Ganges in Bihar. The laws of geology and physics cause rivers to course back and forth across
such fans in ephemeral channels lasting decades at most, but for flood control reasons man-made
embankments endeavored to contain the Koshi within a channel along its fan's western edge. On
18 August, heavy monsoon rains caused the river to break out of this channel. It started flowing
through an old channel much further east, inundating cropland and towns and villages with 1.2
million inhabitants, mostly in Bihar.
Chief Minister of Bihar Nitish Kumar met India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to seek his
help in dealing with the "catastrophe".
[9][10]
The worst affected districts included Supaul,
Madhepura, north Bhagalpur, Araria, Purnia (all by the Kosi) and West Champaran (by Gandak).
Relief work was carried with Indian Air Force helicopters dropping relief materials in the worst
hit districts.
[9]

The district magistrate of Madhepura has ordered the inhabitants of the town of Madhepura to
evacuate because the water level continued to rise. Relief work was carried with Indian Air Force
helicopters dropping relief materials (including 600 food packets per day) from Purnia in the
worst hit districts where nearly two million persons were entrapped.
[9]
It is not possible to assess
the magnitude of deaths or destruction, because the affected areas are totally inaccessible. Even
mobile phones had stopped working, because entrapped persons cannot get their batteries
charged. 150 persons were washed away in a single incident (Dainik Hindustan, Darbhanga
edition). Another report says 42 people have died in the flood in Bihar.
[11]

The Government of Bihar has constituted a technical committee, headed by retired engineer-in-
chief of the water resource department, Nilendu Sanyal, to manage the restoration work and
closure of the breach in the East Koshi afflux embankment.
[11]
Indian authorities were working to
prevent further widening of the breach and channels would be dug to direct the water back to the
main river bed.
[12]
However, Dainik Hindustan (Darbhanga edition) reported on Aug 28 that
Indian officials were chased away by anti-social elements from the breach site in Nepal. Nepal's
Defence Minister has made a statement that Nepal will repair the breach on its own, although it
was not made clear when this work will be started.
Dainik Hindustan (Darbhanga edition) later sent its reporter to the site of the Kushaha breach,
who reported with photographs on Sep 5 that all earlier claims by government officials of
repairing the breach and of Nepalis chasing away Indian officials were utterly false reports by
Indian officials, because there were thick forests on the embankment and it was not possible to
reach the site before the end of August. Forest on the embankment proves that these parts of Kosi
embankments were not even visited for decades. Its maintenance was the responsibility of
Indian, especially Bihar's officials. The life of these embankments elapsed over two decades ago,
but no effort was taken to even survey their conditions, although the Bihar government spends
huge sums on the maintenance of embankments each year.
A high-level Government of Nepal team that inspected areas devastated by the flood in the Koshi
River has held India responsible for the havoc. Media reports stated The devastation took place
as the Indian side did not carry out repair and maintenance work on the Kosi barrage and the
embankment along the river, thereby violating the Nepal-India Koshi agreement. As per the
bilateral agreement of 1954
[13][14]
India is entirely responsible for repair and maintenance work
and operation of the barrage.
[15]
There was no effort by Indian officials to repair the breach in
time, although the Kosi took 15 days to make the breach.
On the other hand, Indian engineers say that anti-social elements in Nepal did not allow them to
repair the embankment (Dainik Hindustan, Darbhanga edition, Aug 28). These so-called "anti-
social" elements are the victims of the Kosi embankments who have been forced to bear tsunami-
like floods every year;
[16]
they are happy that the river wants to change its course. Kosi
embankments are designed to contain the Kosi in the channel of the Tilyuga River, while the old
course of the Kosi lies far to the east in Purnia district. Later, Dainik Hindustan reported on Sep
5 that Indian officials could not reach the site of breach as there were forests on the embankment
which were cleared in early September, hence Indian officials were lying about being prevented
to repair the breach: they had not visited the site for decades due to forests in the way.
The New York Times reported that it is the worst flood in the area in 50 years, prompting
Manmohan Singh to declare a national calamity on 28 August. The government earmarked
US$230 million in aid for the region.
[17]
The Indian Army, National Disaster Response Force
(NDRF) and non-governmental organizations
[18]
operated the biggest flood rescue operation in
India in more than 50 years. Death tolls rose from Indian floods as more than 65 people had been
killed in monsoon rains.
[19]
Villagers ate raw rice and flour mixed with polluted water in Bihar,
amid hunger and diseases. Supaul district was the worst-hit by floods and surging waters
swamped 1,000 square kilometres (250,000 acres) of farmlands, destroying wheat and paddy
crops.
[20]


The Kosi before it flooded in August 2008

The Kosi during the August 2008 flood
September flooding
In September, even as the Bihar floods had not receded completely, the north-eastern state of
Assam faced floods with rising waters from the Brahmaputra River. Kaziranga National Park,
which has the highest density of rhinos in the world, was 90% submerged in water. Also, Pobitra
national park in Assam was flooded. Two rhinos have died in these floods. A tiger has killed one
rhino calf. In addition, four deer and one elephant have also failed to survive. The flood situation
has affected estimated 2.1 million people and caused 24 deaths so far. Worst affected districts are
Dhubri, Jorhat, Kamrup, Lakhimpur
[disambiguation needed]
, Dhemaji and Morigaon. Thousands of
people are staying in makeshift shelters with the government providing food and other essentials
to the displaced people, besides healthcare facilities.
[21]
Indian officials say that the flooding
situation could cause an epidemic, because refugees are consuming unclean water and food in
shelters.
[22]

Breaches in embankments have caused these floods in Assam. Four embankments on the
Puthimari River, one constructed just three months ago, were breached causing the calamity.
[23]

Waters have breached embankments at total 54 vital locations,
[21]
and water levels are
dangerously high in about 10 points.
[22]

The Irish government is sending 350,000 (Rs. 22.3 million) in aid to the victims of the
floods.
[24]

Eastern Orissa state and most populous northern state Uttar Pradesh were flooded heavily
causing more than 150 deaths from September 19 to September 22.
[25]
Army has reached in UP
to rescue at least a quarter million people and food packets have been supplied to the rescued.
[26]