Where Deluge is Just a Mile Away

Fazilpur AZILPUR sounds like one of those countless anonymous places in the hinterland whichmay never make it to the national consciousness. That is, unless tragedy strikes—asit is poised to. The people of Fazilpur, in West Bengal’s Murshidabad district, are,literally, living on the edge of history. If the Ganga and Bhagirathi—now flowingonly 1.3 km apart at Fazilpur—come together, it could be one of the worst naturalcalamities the country has seen for some time, perhaps surpassing even the Bengal famineof the early ’40s in terms of the overall loss of life and property.

Says Debabrata Bandopadhyay, state irrigation minister, who hails fromMurshidabad: "If the rivers merge, not just Murshidabad, the entire south Bengal,even Calcutta, will go under. We can’t let this happen, come what may."Interviews with officials, experts and the common people reveal that what everybody iscounting on is hope. Not that hope is well-founded—the eastward shift of the Gangahas been a settled fact of life in these parts for some decades now. And even if the 1.3km distance from doom is maintained for now, the long-term ecological threat over theentire area will continue to exist.

The issue also engenders the usual Centre-versus-state controversies.Amarendra Chatterjee, executive engineer, irrigation, for instance, feels the crisisnecessitates greater manpower at his disposal. "The issue can’t be viewed inisolation from the overall problem of natural erosion in the right banks (the Indian side;the left bank lies in Bangladesh, where the Ganga is called Padma). It’s this erosionthat changes the river’s course in the alluvial plain." Boulders, protective"aprons" and other devices costing around Rs 11 crore have been put up, and a Rs17-crore scheme is on the anvil to protect new erosion-hit areas. "We need at leastRs 450 crore more to tackle the problem in Malda and Murshidabad. No state government canfind such resources on its own," says Chatterjee. The Centre has responded in thepast but more aid—in cash and in kind—is required on an urgent basis.

Fazilpur, however, is nonchalant. The posters proclaim business asusual: a meeting to be addressed by Chief Minister Jyoti Basu in January, an all-partymarch demanding more industries for Murshidabad, a new circus coming to the districtcapital Berhampur and another ‘jatra’ festival. No signs of an apocalypticvision. Hemmed in between the two mighty streams, its denizens have grown used to theever-present danger. "We don’t think the rivers will really merge. Theauthorities just can’t let it happen—the cost of such an accident will beimmense," says Noor Mohammad, a local tailor, as he takes up a new cloth forstitching in his shop.

Sitting in his office near Fazil-pur at Raghunathganj, Chatter-jee echoes thesentiment. "We’ve been able to maintain the width of 1.3 km for three yearsnow...the measures seem to be taking effect. We hope that in time the Ganga, a much biggerstream than the Bhagirathi which runs through Calcutta, will change its course and moveaway. The alternative is too bleak to contemplate.... I don’t think we can saveCalcutta or south Bengal." A grim scenario indeed, given that an estimated 50 millionout of the state’s total population of 65 million live in south Bengal.

A state government that has unfailingly sponsored bandhs to protestagainst the economic blockade of Cuba has, surprisingly, been low key about the dangerlurking in its own backyard. All-party delegations to the Centre, unanimous resolutions inthe state assembly and the occasional visit by a central team have been the only signs ofofficial recognition of what is perhaps the gravest threat to post-Independence Bengal.Says Rabi Ghosh, lecturer in a Calcutta college who hails from Berham-pur: "The humanfactor has always played a role in natural calamities in eastern India. They blamed humangreed for the famine. If Murshidabad goes under, human negligence will beresponsible."

 Says Sunil Munsi, president of the Geographical Society of India: "There’sa lobby which claims our territory is affected by the protection work undertaken by theBangla authorities on their side. But this is yet to be proved. Who has prevented us fromprotecting our side? There are 54 rivers flowing through the two countries. Rightly orwrongly, Bangladesh insists the Farakka barrage has led to the desertification of largetracts of cultivable land on their side. Instead of a dialogue, we have a deadlock. Wherecoordination and constant monitoring is called for, there’s distrust andarbitrariness."

Over the past few years, an estimated 480 sq km of land has been eroded by the Bhagirathiin Murshidabad alone. And Munsi would rather not bank on just hope. "To begin with,1.3 km is too close for comfort, as hydrological changes are hard to predict. The factthat it’s been like this for the last three years means little...three years arenothing. We should have initiated measures long before the two rivers were thisclose."

The politics of the issue, of course, emphasises other aspects. An all-party team headedby Chief Minister Basu, in a recent memo submitted to the Centre, noted not just thethreat of calamity but "the dimension of the loss of Indian territory toBangladesh". It says: "The left bank of the Padma downstream of Nimtita (20 kmdownstream of the Farakka barrage) is in Bangladesh. So any loss of land on the right bankmeans a permanent loss of Indian territory."

 Under international law, when a river is mutually accepted as the boundary betweentwo countries, the border is the line running through the middle of the stream. If theriver shifts (in this case both the shift of the Ganga and the accompanying erosion helpBangladesh), the authorities usually work out the old alignments again to ensure thatneither side benefits unduly from unpredictable natural processes. In actuality, however,human settlements come up on both sides, as does cultivation. And though encroachment isnot an issue initially, local tensions are inevitable in due course.

According to Chatterjee, existing anti-erosion measures in areas likeJalangi, Akihiriganj and Raghunath-ganj will arrest soil loss for at least three or fouryears. But since the problem may just crop up elsewhere, threatening new areas, ceaselessvigil throughout the district is a must. The new Rs 17-crore scheme is geared towards thisend. In Akhiri-ganj, large plots were threatened after the disastrous spell of unseasonalrains in September 1995 that left half the state submerged for days on end. Despiteresource constraints, work has begun to protect vulnerable areas like Maheshpur, wherelast year some 12 huts were washed away by the Bhagi-rathi’s swirling waters.

The Bhagirathi takes off from the Ganga near Jangipur, where a barrage hasbeen built to control flood inflows from the bigger stream. For, engaged in the process ofdelta-building, rivers naturally shift their courses. Munsi explains that it is not theriverbeds themselves that shift. What happens is that the stream gets deeper on one sideand shallow on the other for natural reasons, occasionally leading to the emergence ofstrips of flood-prone soil. If the Ganga’s path is to be diverted away from theBhagirathi, the deeper stream the river currently pursues has to be changed. Experts doubtwhether the country has the technological savvy to undertake any operation of thisnature—it’s certainly beyond any state government. Munsi, for instance, feelsinternational cooperation is a necessity.

In the absence of a solution as fundamental as rechanging the course ofshifting rivers, the state authorities are left with little manoeuverability—exceptcontinuing risk-reducing measures like extensive bouldering supported by aprons. Theaprons help to hold the boulder in place even if fluctuating flows cause some slippage.While the embankments are holding up, such measures aren’t inspiring much confidence."In Murshidabad alone, we’ve seen entire buildings, police stations andthree-storey structures vanish into the expanding stream as banks gave way. At first, thebig boulders are also swept away. It’s only later that the protective structuresbegin to stabilise. But in the long run, the problem of erosion has to be tackled right atthe source itself," says a resident of Raghunathganj, fearing the worst.

As recently as September 1994, the Ganga eroded 400 metres of land nearJalangi—destroying homesteads, schools, thanas, the panchayat office, and displacing12,000 people. State leaders had met the Prime Minister in August 1993 and submitted amemorandum calling for upgrading assistance by at least 50 per cent beyond the Eighth Planoutlay of Rs 280 crore. The attempt was a damp squib. And the ultimate outcome may be moredamp than anyone could care to imagine.