Once again, at least 123 people have been killed due to the floods in Assam. Over 56 lakh people are directly affected in 30 districts.
Thousands of people were displaced in the Assam floods. 95% of the Kaziranga National Park was inundated when the floods were at their peak.
In 2014, 124 people were killed due to floods in the northeastern states and Assam. In 2015, 42 people were killed, 28 people were killed in 2016, 85 people in 2017, 12 people in 2018, and last year, 91 people were killed due to floods in Assam.
Years after Years people get killed. This affects the lives of lakhs of people. Several animals in the national park also get killed. In 2016, 350 animals were killed and 503 animals were killed in 2017. Floods now kill more one-horned rhinos at Kaziranga than poachers.
Villages, crops and even basic infrastructure gets destroyed. In 2012, floods cost Assam around Rs 3,200 crore. The state loses around 8,000 sq.km of land to erosion due to flooding every year.
Assam
Assam has always been India’s most flood-prone state and has been one of the world’s most flood-prone areas.
The reason behind this is the river Brahmaputra. The river Brahmaputra is so vast that it is even visible from space. The river cuts Northeast India’s biggest state Assam into two halves.
The Brahmaputra is both a lifeline and a threat to Assam. It is a huge river system of multiple channels and water bodies and crisscrossing large part of the states. But the river Brahmaputra is a very unstable river. It changes its course a lot.
Also Read: Why Britain is center of the World?
In fact, the researchers have discovered that, In the 1950s, a massive earthquake was struck in Northeast India.
Ever since that earthquake, Brahmaputra River has become even more unstable. Between the 1950s and 2010, there have been around 12 major floods in Assam.
But you would notice that in the last few years, major floods have occurred almost every year. The frequency of Assam floods has increased very much.
So why has the frequency of the floods increased?
There are many factors that have increased the frequency of Assam floods. Some of them are:
1. Deforestation on a massive scale
Deforestation plays a major role in the flooding equation because trees prevent sediment runoff and forests hold and use more water than farms or grasslands.
Tree roots absorb water from the soil, making the soil drier and able to store more rainwater. It also holds the soil in place, reducing the movement of sediment that can shrink river channels downstream.
A study carried out by the Indian Institute of Remote Sensing has predicted depletion of 9,007.14 square km (2.94 per cent) of forests in parts of Assam by 2028.
Many districts of Assam have faced deforestation, due to the increasing human population and subsequent demand for land for cultivation which are the major reasons for forest depletion.
Rampant deforestation and hill cutting have worsened the situation which leads to flooding.
2. Encroachment of flood plains and wetlands
Floodplains are the nearby areas of a river’s course when there is an excess volume of water in the river; it flows out over the floodplains.
Damage to floodplains harm the riverine ecosystem lessens groundwater recharge capacity and poses threats of flash floods.
Builders and other people have started construction of houses on these floodplains.
They started development due to which the river water does not have room to flow. As a result, water flows into people’s homes.
3. Improper Drainage system
A July 2014 report ‘Review of Studies on Urban Floods in Guwahati’ prepared by the All India Disaster Mitigation Institute for the Assam State Disaster Management Authority notes the city does not have a planned drainage system.
4. Climate Change
Climate change is a major factor for increasing the frequency of these floods. Due to climate change the number of days (on which) rainfall used to occur is diminishing.
When it rains, it rains with more intensity; the cases of excessive rainfall are on the rise due to which floods occur.
The total number of days of rainfall is falling due to which the situation of water crisis and drought situation is also increasing.
Also Read: Can Sea Water Desalination solve the World’s Water Crisis?
In Eastern Himalayas, due to climate change, the glaciers melting in the summer coincides with monsoon intensifying downstream causing the annual flooding.
The glaciers melt faster due to which the Brahmaputra brings a huge volume of water leading to the floods.
5. Improper construction of embankments
Embankments/Dykee is the wall that is constructed on the bank of the rivers to control the flow of the river and direct it in a particular way and to prevent the flooding of the nearby areas.
Historically all believe that this is a simple way to stop the rivers from flooding. They can be made of concrete or even mud.
US civil Engineer Charles Ellet Jr. cautioned in the 19th century that “Embankments confined rivers and cause them to rise higher and flow faster”.
The problem that arises while building an embankment is that whenever you try to restrict a flow and tries to reduce its area, and then the speed of the flow of the water and its level will increase and sedimentation of a river increases if the area of the flow of the river is reduced.
So the build-up of sedimentation in the embankment, if it is not removed and maintained properly the level of the river will continually rise and then water will start to flow over the embankments.
Then there’d be no use of Embankments because the outside areas would be flooded the same as earlier.
Another thing is that the people who are living beside the embankments that are lulled into a false sense of security.
They feel that the constructed embankments will ensure that the river flows in the same area.
But they did not know that before the construction of the embankments, the river flowed over a larger area, its sedimentation used to spread over a larger area, due to which there was obviously flooding before as a flood plain existed earlier.
Now the people who are living besides embankments have also increased their chances of getting flooded.
5.1. Embankment breaching
When an embankment fails to stop the water, then it is called an embankment breaching.
This can happen in two ways. First when the river level rises so high that water begins to overflow from the top and the second thing that can happen is that the embankment breaks.
A hole can arise in the middle somewhere. It could be weak at some point and the water starts to flow out of the hole.
If it so happens, then there’d be no use of embankments, thus it is said that “An embankment is only strong as its weakest point”!
Because a break at the point could lead to floods everywhere. Thus if any resourceful arrangements were made while constructions then the entire thing could break. It needs more regular maintenance.
In Assam, there are around 450 embankments on the banks of rivers and more than half of them are in an extremely “vulnerable” condition that can break easily.
Researchers believe that there is an ongoing administrations-contractor nexus in Assam. Whenever floods occur, some people earn a lot of money. The contractors that construct these embankments newly construct them after every flood and earn a lot of money.
5.2. Downsides of Embankments
In 2017, the Ministry of Highways decided to build a 1300 km long highway beside the Brahmaputra in Assam and there’d also be an embankment along the highway to prevent floods.
After 2017, there have been no updates to, map its progress but a lot of people are against the construction of such a huge highway and such a huge embankment.
Also Read: Why Does Norway Have So Many Teslas?
A lot of environmentalist claims that construction of embankments leads to an increase in flooding.
The reason behind that is the flow of the river increases drastically and if these embankments are not constructed properly, the stream of the river would be stronger, they’d break with greater intensity due to which the nearby residents will face more floods and there’d be more destruction.
A study of 2018 stated that the Mississippi River in the US, due to embankments the chances of occurrence of floods have increased by 75%.
The floods that used to occur once in 100 years now have an increased frequency of occurrence by 75 % due to this embankment.
So what is the Solution?
The Solution to the Assam floods lies in the Netherlands.
Netherland Case Study
The Netherlands is the world’s best country in matters of flood control.
The first photo is of the 1300s and the second photo is of 2019. You can see how much land have they reclaimed from the sea in 700 Years, that is the lands that lay inundated previously, was taken out from the water.
Doing this would mean, obviously, that the chances of flooding in these areas are extremely high because actually, it is used to be a sea earlier. So obviously, they undertook a lot of flood control measures.
They have also written in their constitution that the Dutch people have a right to be protected from flooding.
They have high standards regarding flood safety whenever they adopt a new flood control measure then they do so while keeping in mind that a huge and colossal flood that can occur once in 10,000 years, our country should be safe from even that.
None of our cities should get flooded from even that. For comparison the standard in the USA is that of 100 years to prevent floods.
To achieve all this, they have installed high-tech sensors and constructed mighty infrastructure projects. In the past few years, the Netherlands initiated a project called “Room for River Project”.
They realized that it is not always good to build huge machinery for infrastructure projects. To focus on a river’s natural environment and its flow and construct your infrastructure accordingly is much better and cheaper in the long run.
Solution to Assam Floods:
The simplest thing Netherland did was to relocate embankments further away from the rivers that are the river was given a larger area to flow. So whatever small changes occur in the flow of the river, it can spread over a larger area. The problem of sedimentation also reduced drastically.
Another thing they did was to further lower the level of the flood plains that provided more height to the river to flow.
The river beds were dug up to further lower them so that river gets more space to flow and all the obstacles in a way of the river was removed.
And they allowed the river to flow freely. And for water storage, they created a reservoir. So if a flood occurs, all the water will start to collect there in one place.
Netherland also constructed embankments further away and started to grow trees along the floodplain area inside.
The natural greenery and natural forestation further enhanced flood protection before the embankments.
So in today’s times, the rivers in the Netherlands look somewhat like this.
You can see a lot of green area near them and the embankments constructed are so far away from the rivers.
So these are some simple steps that the Netherlands adopted under its “Room for River Project”.
So I feel this would not be difficult to implement in India. I hope that while constructing such lengthy highways and embankments along with it, it keeps such small things into consideration.
Rivers should be given a larger area for free flow so that flood prevention becomes easier.
I hope such a day will come when so many floods cease to happen and we are able to save so many lives.
Thank you for taking the time to read this! Please share this article if you enjoyed it. Also, you can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Pinterest to get more interesting articles.
नमस्ते! मुझे ये जानकर बहुत खेद हुआ कि आसाम मैं बाड़ आ रही है । आपकी बताई जानकारी बहुत महत्वपूर्ण है । आपने जो लिखा उससे मैं बहुत प्रभावित हुआ । आप बहुत अच्छा और स्पष्ट शब्दों मैं लिखते है। इस जानकारी के लिए ध्यानवाद ।
Ohh now i knew how it happens and why it happens thanks for the info….