Flood And After- New Kerala, Green Kerala

Was the deluge so terrible because of poor planning and meddling with nature? Environmental concerns must come to the fore as Kerala rebuilds.

- Minu Ittyipe In Chalakudy, Aluva, And Chengannur

The night of August 15 was menacingly dark, recalls Rosie Thelakkat, 73, with a painful shudder. As the torrential rains bore down, the floodwaters swiftly devoured everything in their path. The deafening roar of the rushing waters was broken by the terrified cries of animals for miles around the farmlands of Thykoodam Kadakootti, Chalakudy. Only later would Rosie learn that their two cows had survived the flood by standing on their hind legs, holding onto the barn’s wall for a whole night and day, with their noses stretched above the water, while their calves drowned beside them.

Unable to escape in time, Rosie, her two sons and their spouses had huddled under a sunshade on the roof of her home, watching helplessly as her elder son’s house was swiftly submerged under the waters. “We spent a sleepless night watching the dark swirling waters stealthily inching towards us. We just waited, knowing well that there was no escape. It was only by the next afternoon that the fishermen came to rescue us,” says Rosie, her eyes welling up. “The flood took away everything that we had. There’s nothing that has not been destroyed.”

Like lakhs of others affected by the great flood of Kerala, Rosie’s family are cleaning their home of the tonnes of slushy silt that the receding waters left in their wake. The stench of alluvium and waste, an ancient beast regurgitated by the Chalakudy river, is hard to shake offeven after the sun has come out. There’s no one in Chalakudy market (on a higher gradient than Thykoodam) who has not felt the crippling loss of goods and life savings. They rush towards us, hands folded, urging us to visit their shops, hoping that we are efficient government officials come to survey and quickly enumerate their loss and pain. How will we recover the loss, how will we rebuild our lives…these are questions on many a lip.