In the grip of yet another spell of flood : 3rd case in a span of 3 months
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: August 21, 2024 -

2023 was bad, in fact very bad.

2024 has been no better so far and apart from the ethnic conflict, for which no compromise formula has been worked out, mother nature has pummelled Manipur on different occasions and while the end of May and early days of July will be remembered for the heavy rain that lashed the State and wreaked havoc all over the place, August seems set to experience heavy flooding once again.

Making things all that more uncertain is the report from the Indian Meteorological Department which has predicted heavy rains till August 24 and clearly things do not look good at all for the place and her people.

Certainly the rain God has not been kind this time and no one knows what will befall Manipur in the coming days.

From the last days of May to the early days of June to the early days of July to now, that is the end part of the second week of August with no signs that the rain will stop soon, Manipur has been at the receiving end of one of the worst spells of rainfall in the last 3/4 decades.

In a span of four months, Manipur has been whipped by spells of heavy rain and even as this commentary is being penned down, reports of houses and agricultural fields being flooded and ravaged by the rain have come in particularly from Thoubal and Bishnupur districts.

Almost all the major rivers are in spate with the water level at some of the more important rivers rising dangerously close to the warning level.

This was on August 19 evening and with the rain showing no signs of abating, nothing can be said with certainty now.

This however should not mean that the Government should be caught napping.

It has to step in and work out the damages caused by the third spell of heavy rain and see what measures ought to be taken up, especially for the farmers who may have suffered their third successive loss.

This is August and work at the paddy fields must be on in right earnest but now with the sky opening up in all its glory for the last 72 hours without a break and with so many fields reportedly being flooded at Thoubal and Bishnupur side, the harvest this year could be anything but handsome.

Inundated fields and roads and this is what has defined the valley area of Manipur for the better part of 2024 and one wonders what steps the Government may take up to address the woes of the people, especially the farmers.

The staple food in Manipur is rice and with a poor harvest more than likely this year too, the challenge before the Government to meet the food requirements of the people can only be imagined.

Take the prospect of a poor harvest against the fact that many small time business houses and enterprises have had to shut down ever since the ethnic violence erupted on May 3, 2023 and the tragedy that has been scripted to identify Manipur is complete.

Heavy rain and earlier in May a spell of heavy hailstorm devastated a number of houses in Manipur and if 2023 will be remembered as the year of the clash between the Meiteis and the Kukis, then 2024 will be remembered as the year of the ongoing ethnic clash, the hailstorm of May, the heavy rains in May, then in July and now August.

Living up to the understanding of the line, ‘when misfortune comes, it comes in dozens’ and Manipur has seen it all and experienced it all, all in the span of 15 months or so.

The cup of woes of the people is definitely running over and making things worse for all is the acute shortage of cooking gas and now petrol.

The Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Department may maintain that there is enough stock of petrol at the Malom Oil Depot, but the fact is many of the fuel outlets at Imphal were adorned by the words, ‘Petrol Nil’ on August 20, which is for the second day on the trot.

The NHIDCL and the Government are best placed to answer on the state of National Highway-37 or the Imphal-Jiribam line, but what everyone knows is the fact that this route comes nowhere near the understanding of a National Highway.

Even long before the ethnic violence erupted on May 3, 2023 and long before the heavy rains of 2024, travelling along this highway was a nightmare.

For the record it took nearly 28 hours to travel from Guwahati to Imphal along this route and this is saying something a lot.

The world may have moved on but this highway continues to be stuck in a time warp, refusing to move along with the demands of the modern times.