Kanchanpur Flood: Displaced flood victims still living under open sky

Bedkot: As many as 15 families at Ekanta Tole in Shuklaphanta Municipality-12 in Kanchanpur district have been residing in the jungle since the flood on September 16 this year displaced them.

The displaced ones have been living under the open sky with a tarpaulin over their heads, shared Meghu Bohara, one of the flood survivors. “All goods including clothes inside the house were swept away by the flood. Only pillars of the houses are left out,” he narrated.

The flood in Banahara River last Friday has left them in the lurch, he bemoaned, worrying about when and how to return back to the flood-engulfed house. “Neither do we have bedding nor food items.”

According to him, the amount of rice they were provided as relief material was also running short. “We have been living in a makeshift tent for so many days. What will we eat after rice stock also finishes?”

Similarly, Hari Krishna Bhatta anxiously shared, “The house is rendered uninhabitable. We have not returned home due to fear of an unexpected turn of events in the aftermath of the flood. The grains and crops cultivated and estimated to last long for years are also mixed with mud. How do fend off families? Famine is likely.”

The flood damaged crops and grains cultivated by Bhatt’s family across 15 kattha land. “Apart from crops, nut, lentil and sesame farming were also covered by soil.” According to him, they had not experienced such a flood for a decade and a half.

Similarly, landless squatters of flood-affected Banahara camp at Shuklaphanta municipality-11 are also in distress.

Altogether thirty families of Banahara camp have been sharing a similar fate as flood-displaced families of Ekanta Tole. Landless squatters of Banahara complained that although they have been facing the repercussion of floods every year, the government had not yet addressed their problems.

Mandhoj Luhar shared that mud had piled inside the houses due to the flood and there was no favourable condition to stay in the settlement.

“We have got rice. But we do not have utensils to cook food. Where and how to cook food? There is no water in the settlement either, he whined.

Likewise, Devaki Bista lamented that they have been bearing pain in the lack of sustainable management of flood through flood affects their settlement every year.

Mayor of Shuklaphanta Municipality, Rana Bahadur Mahara, informed that the flood-affected people were shifted to safer places as well as arrangement of lodging and food for flood-affected ones was made.

Mahara further called for provincial and federal governments’ support for post-disaster relief and compensation drive to flood-affected ones.