40 villages under Banjariya Block in E Champaran still reeling under flood fury

Satish Aditya
Motihari  : Four -feet deep water is still flowing at Banjariya  Block Office  and FCI Godown, hardly 2 km away in north from Motihari , headquarters of East Champaran district in North Bihar, for the last 10 days, as the district was ravaged by flood twice in last one fortnight. The block office has been running  temporarily from Motihari Town.

Forty villages under  13  panchayats under Banjariya block located in low lying areas on the eastern side of NH- 28A bear the brunt of  the deluge every year with Burhi Gandak  and three hilly rivers inundating these villages keeping about 40,000 villagers trapped for  20 to 25 days.

Although the water of  river Bagmati, Lalbakeya, and Burhi Gandak  started receding on July 27, 2019, the  situation in
40 villages  under Banjariya block  continues to be grim. The water of Burhi Gandak is flowing three to four feet deep under five panchayat while in three/ four panchayats it is flowing two- and-a-half-feet deep. The  situation is almost the same in some part of Dhaka, Patahi, Chiraiya, and Sugauli blocks.

On July 28, 2019, PHED Minister Vinod Narayan Jha, Minister Incharge, East Champaran district, cancelled his  flood review  meeting here due to some unavoidable reason. East Champaran DM Raman Kumar said that 1.38 lakh families of 94
panchayats under 11 blocks  have been affected by the flood and more than 99  community kitchens were  running in marooned villages where cooked food were supplied  to those affected by the flood. The GR of  Rs 6,000 each had been was transferred   into the bank accounts of 56,000 flood affected families  till date.

Senior CPM leader and former MLA from Sugauli Ramashray Singh claimed that only two country boats had been provided by the district administration for communication in this block and patient were being taken to Motihari on cots. Hundreds
of flood victims have taken shelter  on NH28 A and railway tracks and no readymade food was being supplied to then by administration.

Mujibur Rahaman of Siswaniya said  that he had come to Motihari to purchase medicine  wading through chest deep water  from his village as there is no boat there. The residents of Jatawa, Janerawa, Rohinia, and other villages have taken shelter on  taking shelter on rooftop of pucca buildings.