The river they once knew so well now seems to be turning on the people living on either side of the 150-km stretch of the Ganga upstream and downstream of the Farakka Barrage in West Bengal. Bit by bit, it has been shifting course, and eating into their lands. Some 400 square kilometres of it, to be precise, across 15 blocks in the Malda, Murshidabad and Nadia districts. So reveals a recent report by the West Bengal government. Even places that saw no erosion in the past six decades have now become vulnerable, it seems.
As a result, lakhs of people in the vicinity of the river live with the constant threat of erosion and the consequent loss of home and hearth. Heavy sedimentation upstream, multiple dams on the river that do not leave enough water for the sedimentation to be pushed into the delta, and an erratic weather pattern are altering the river’s natural course, forcing it to breach the banks and dislodge the soil. That, in turn, has led to widespread displacement of people, with neither the Centre nor the state offering them anything by way of succour, monetary or otherwise.
SAJIDA KHATUN, 8
Sitting by the river bank, little Sajida holds her baby sister and looks out to the now calm river, hoping it will return her dolls. Sajida’s father and his six brothers from Paschimpara village in Samserganj lost their homes and cultivable lands to the river. When the water had come flooding in the early hours of morning, destroying everything in its path, Sajida had been barely awake. All she remember hearing was some commotion and the next thing she knew, her mother ws dragging her out of the house. Sajida’s only regret? That she did not have the chance to save her dolls.
Esta historia es de la edición April 18, 2022 de India Today.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 8500 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición April 18, 2022 de India Today.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 8500 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Grand Young Master
Seventeen-yearold D. Gukesh has become the youngest player to win the Candidates chess tournament
SPORTING SPIRIT
BADMINTON PLAYER ASHWINI PONNAPPA, 34, IS OFF TO HER THIRD OLYMPICS, THIS TIME WITH A NEW PARTNER, TANISHA CRASTO
PORTRAITS OF A PEOPLE
Etchings by the colonial Flemish artist F. Baltazard Solvyns are getting a new lease of life in an exhibition at the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum, Mumbai
Centennial Man
A seminal exhibition of K.G. Subramanyan's works in his birth centenary year at Emami Art, Kolkata takes an imaginative and immersive curatorial approach
Rhythms of Nature
ARTIST AND MUSIC COMPOSER GINGGER SHANKAR'S LATEST SINGLE COMBINES SOUTH INDIAN MUSIC WITH INUIT THROAT SINGING
SEARCHING FOR THE SOUND
Kashmiri musician Faheem Abdullah’s debut album Lost; Found is a collaborative effort
FOUND IN TRANSLATION
With its excellent translations, Songs of Tagore makes Rabindrasangit accessible to the non-Bengali reader
Of Freedom and Friendship
T.C.A. RAGHAVAN'S CIRCLES OF FREEDOM FOLLOWS THREE YOUNG MUSLIMS DRAWN INTO THE FREEDOM STRUGGLE
The Razor's Edge
Salman Rushdie's Knife is an eloquent, first-person account of the horrific attack on him. It's also a love story
THE LAST-MILE PUSH
The India Today Smart Money Financial Summit had top experts discussing how technology could be leveraged to widen the reach of personal finance tools