नहि बदलल ध्यय, नहि बदलल धाम, बस बदलल साइटक नाम
अपार हर्षक संग सूचित कए रहल छी जे समाद शीघ्र अपन नव रूप मे अहांक समक्ष प्रस्तुत भ रहल अछि। पिछला तीन माह स हम सब एहि लेल प्रशिक्षण लेबा मे लागल रही। ब्लॉक क सीमा देखलाक बाद समाद परिवार अपन अल्प संसाधन मे डॉट कॉम क नव दलान पर जेबाक निर्णय लेलक अछि। आशा अछि जे अहांक स्नेह हमरा लोकनि कए नव दलान पर सेहो भेटत। एहि नवका दलान पर एबा लेल समाद परिवारक दिस स समस्त लोकनि कए नोत, हकार आ लियउन । नव दलानक पता अछि…….http://.esamaad.com

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Edit: I cannot believe I made that joke. Ahem…

Yesterday, I managed to get to my regular dojo for the first time in a couple of weeks. Recently I’ve had a lot of things going on in my private life, coupled with a short period of poor health, which contributed to me missing keiko. But that’s not a topic for this blog.

I naturally was terrible in keiko. By the end I was clawing back some ability and actually had improved in a couple of areas. My sensei are encouraging me to use seme (one of them made me tsuki him repeatedly to get the feeling required for a good men strike), to strike better small waza (“don’t hit like a student, hit like an adult!” – more on that later) and to judge maai better. I can judge maai reasonably well when I concentrate and stop thinking too much. I just let that slip far too often and fail to strike a good balance between speed and technique. By the end of practice I was back on form, but at the start this was particularly poor.

Another major issue is one that I’ve been thinking about for a while and was today clarified for me. My stance is way too narrow. By this I mean that my feet are not shoulder-width apart: they’re much closer together than that. This is a bad habit that persists in my iai and that recently I’ve been working on eradicating. I had no idea it had been affecting my kendo as well, though. It not only makes me unbalanced, it takes away power from my lower body, stops me standing square and generally messes up my entire form. My solution is to keep focusing on my left hip and my feet. Squaring up my left hip and standing with my feet further apart gives me much more power in my lower body, and helps maintain a good stance in both iai and kendo.

It’s only now I’m really starting to realise how much this habit has been hurting my progress in both iai and kendo. Once I get past this, I wouldn’t be surprised if I make improvements in a couple of other problem areas relatively quickly.

Just a mini blog for now.

Today: correcting my posture and thinking about my hips rather than my hands fixed a million problems with my kendo in an instant.

The importance of correct posture is obvious, but it’s easy to forget about in the middle of keiko.

Fixing posture also improves some unexpected things – the most surprising of which is my ability to judge maai.

So in kendo it seems I need to think about my hips and lower legs. In iai I know I need to think about my hips, lower legs and elbows. I can see a trend emerging here.

After a weekend of keiko in Kansai with my shishō (first and main sensei), I finally found a way to completely relax my upper body. It is difficult to explain but it mainly involved controlled breathing. Thanks to this, I managed to do some of the best iai of my life. It is also important to note that my shishō is very good at using his hips in iai and whenever I train with him this rubs off a little, adding much more dynamism and explosiveness to my waza. In short, it was a great weekend of training, which I’ll be writing more about later.

Coming back to Kyushu, I was determined to continue this “nobi nobi” (relaxed, at ease) feeling. I spent the day at work running through simple breathing exercises to ensure my upper body was relaxed. When I finally got to the dojo, though, the one thing I was constantly told was that I was using far too much upper body strength. This really confused me, as I was probably the most relaxed I had ever been in keiko (the preceding weekend excluded) and I was using much less arm and shoulder strength than normal.

A few days later and I’ve finally worked it out. It wasn’t that I was using more upper body strength than normal, but that I was using far less lower body power than normal. Relaxing so much meant that I wasn’t using power properly at all. It seems that the use of the hips and hara that my shishō demonstrates and imparts so well is greatly diminished in my iai when he isn’t around, and this was accentuated by me being relaxed. What I need to do now is capture that feeling of explosiveness, and unleash it very deliberately whilst maintaining relaxation in my upper body. It’s not going to be easy, but I have managed it before to a certain extent, as mentioned above. I just have to find a way to do it without my shishō standing over me.

Another one for my growing list of goals, then.

I am so craving a bowl of Koshi cereal with slices of bananas! Now, I can never imagine the insane cravings a pregnant woman must go through during her nine months of purgatory, which ends by her launching a small fleshy projectile from what was once her canal of happy endings.
All I know is right now, at this moment I am wishing, nay craving madly the sweet crunchy delicious taste of Koshi with banana slices and some good ice cold organic milk! I would Slay seven dragons, save the princess and do it all for free, in exchange for a bowl of this delicious treat right now! OMG! I would snap Osama Bin Landens scrawny hateful neck for this meal!
Why is this is happening? There is nothing worse than being broke when a craving of this magnitude hits the soul like, the desperate lustful desires of a fat child watching crispy cream donuts being fried before the doors open! I am sitting here mouth watering, like a drooling bulldog puppy, with visions of sitting down at the dinning area table, television on, just so no one can hear the crunching joyful noise emanating from my Koshi cereal filled mouth. This passionate desire has me hearkening back to better days, when there was actual food filling my cupboards and fridge, with healthy foods, and joyful treats. Oh Koshi I long for your crunchy goodness, to once again satisfy my morning hunger, and start my day off right. I dream to have you in my belly! SIGH!!!!!
But, I must digress, if but for a moment to be thankful for umm, nah fuck that I want my Koshi and Banana slices now!!!!!! I could sit here and ponder the fact that somewhere else in the world someone would be happy with a grain of rice and some water but, this is America, and I want my damn Koshi! NOW! Now! Now, sigh please?
Have a good day all.

Inspecting the flood-hit regions and meeting with the flood victims in eastern districts of Sunsari and Saptari, Sunday morning October 26, 2008, Koirala also hit at what he called as government's failure to properly rehabilitate the victims of the Koshi inundation.

Tihar, the festival of lights has started from today. Some like Tihar for lights, some for fire crackers, some for langur-burza, and some for Deusi-Bhailo.

Deusi for guys. Bhailo for girls. But it’s be both way for some years now.

It used to be fun when we were kids. Not anymore though. However, our Koirala Bajey does not seem to have lost any ounce of interest for Deusi-Bhailo. Revitalized, reinvigorated, re-energized, Koirala Babu claims:

  Hey, listen up listen up Koshi victims
  Deusi re,
  Why are you so sad?
  Deusi re,
  Listen up listen up people,
  Deusi re,
  Don’t you worry people,
  Deusi re,
  Maoist won’t help you
  Deusi re,
  Maoist CAN’T help you
  Deusi re,
  I will ask for the money
  Hurry Hurry
  Don’t you worry people,
  Deusi re,
  I will talk to India
  Arey waa, arey waa
  I will talk to America
  Yo, Yo
  Come daughter, sing with me
  Deusi re,
  Listen up people, listen up
  Deusi re,
  Don’t you worry a bit.
  Deusi re.

Prachanda Babu must already be ready with his own version of Deusi. Seems like this year’s Tihar is going to be fun.

BY Dinesh Kumar Mishra*

The foundation stone of the Kosi Project was laid on January 14, 1955 amidst fanfare, jubilation and victory. Dr. Shrikrishna Sinha, the then Chief Minister of Bihar, laid the foundation stone near Bhutaha village close to Nirmali, in Saharsa (now Supaul) district with the chanting of mantras by Pt. Mahabir Jha of Jhitki village and shouting of slogans like ‘Aadhi Roti Khayengein, Kosi Bandh Banaayengein.’ (We will eat only half a chapati but we will surely build the Kosi embankments).

A majority of people lost the other half of the bread too on the 18th August 2008 when the Kosi embankment breached on that day. 

Col. Townsend of the US Army while deliberating in a seminar organized by the American Society of Civil Engineers to discuss the Mississippi floods of 1927 had said that even the best designed and carefully constructed embankments remain at the mercy of burrowing animals like rats, foxes, muskrats who can create a hole in the finest levee that has been devised, which if not closed within a few moments will ensure its destruction.  

The Mississippi River of the United States broke loose in 1927 inundating an area of 51,200 sq. kilometer and damaging property to an estimated extent of two hundred million to a billion dollars.  The breaches drove nearly three quarters of a million people from their homes and six hundred thousand of them were dependant on Red Cross. The wealth and power of the United States enabled much to be done for the sufferers, still they suffered.

Col Townsend further added a ‘careless supervisor and dark nights’ to his list of embankment destroyers. His observations remain valid till date as the Kosi comes out of its shackles at Kusaha in Nepal some 13 kilometers upstream of the Kosi Barrage. All the eight breaches that have occurred so far can be brought under these categories. 

 Col. Townsend gave benefit of doubt to the planners and engineers when he prefixed ‘best designed and carefully constructed’ adjectives to the embankments. The Kosi has breached its embankment eighth time and it is for the first time that the ‘disaster’ has generated so much of interest.

The embankments on Kosi are spaced at an average distance of 9 to 10 kilometers below the barrage with a maximum width of 16 kilometres between Kisunipatti and Bhaptiahi and minimum width of nearly 3 kilometres at the barrage itself. The spacing of the embankments is only 8 kilometres at the tail end, between Baluaha Ghat and Ghonghepur. In Nepal portion the spacing between them is restricted to between 3 to 6 kilometers.

Common sense suggests that the spacing between the embankments should increase as the river advances further as more and more streams join the river from western side. This simple common sense was kicked around when these embankments were constructed in late 1950s.

There were 304 villages with a population of 192,000 (1951 census) going to be trapped between the embankments and each one of them was trying to be located outside the embankments. Later the embankments were extended and 380 villages of Bihar and 34 villages of Nepal came within them. Their current population is nearly 1.2 million.  The village locations were fixed and it was the embankment on either side of the river that could be moved. So did it happen. Now the embankment alignment is a caricature of what it was designed, if there was any design. 

Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Teng Tse Hui discussing the floods in the Hwang Ho had once said in 1955 that according to historical records, there have been inundations and breaches on 1500 or more occasions on the lower reaches of the river and there were 26 important changes of course, nine of them major.

The terrible floods of 1933 caused more than 50 breaches of the dykes and brought disaster to more than 11,000sq. km. Over 3,640,000 people were affected and over 18,000 killed. Property worth some 230 million Yuans was lost.

 In 1938, Chiang Kai Shek Government opened the dykes on the south bankof the river at Huayuan Kou near Cheng Chow in Honan province. This led to a major change in the course of the river affecting 54,000 sq. km. with a population of 12,500,000 and 890,000 people died.In a hundred years, from 1855 till 1955, the dykes had breached on 200 occasions. 

In an on-the-spot survey, the river bed in lower reaches was found to be rising by one to ten centimeters every year in the middle of this century. In some cases the existing river bank was found even ten meters higher than the surrounding country level. Such rapid silting cannot be dealt with simply by piling up and reinforcing dykes. In a sense, higher and stronger the dyke, the quicker is the silt deposited because it has no way of getting out.

The Kosi embankments were constructed citing the wonderful performance on these two Chinese rivers. 

Had Col. Townsend been living today, he must have amended his statement saying that the embankments could also be ill-conceived, ill- designed and poorly constructed. Capt. G.F. Hall, former Chief Engineer of Bihar was of the opinion that the embankments can only postpone the day of retribution and will be a store of disaster for the future generation. A status paper prepared by Government of Bihar in 2003 suggests that those who subscribe to such views are the people of colonial mindset. 

The ‘nationalist’ embankment builders had a last laugh when they succeeded in bringing Dr. Rajendra Prasad, then President of India’ to Bihar between 17th to 22nd October 1954 and made him request the people to participate in the ‘yagna’ of nation building by constructing the Kosi embankments. His views in the Patna Flood Conference (1937) were diagonally opposite to what he was made to say in 1954. One can imagine the stress the President might have undergone during that trip of his home state of Bihar. 

Embankments prevent a river from overflowing its banks during floods but they also prevent the entry of floodwater. This leads to a major problem as the embanked river is no longer able to fulfill its primary function – draining out excess water. With the tributaries prevented from discharging into the river and accumulated rainwater finding no way out, the surrounding areas quickly become flooded. The situation is aggravated by seepage from under the embankments.

The areas outside the levees remain waterlogged for months after the rainy season because this water has no way of flowing out to the sea. Theoretically, sluice gates located at these junctions should solve the problem but, in practice, such gates quickly become useless; as the bed level of the main river rises above the surrounding land, operating the gates lets water out instead of allowing outside water in.  When the sluice gates have failed, the only option left is to also embank the tributary.This results, then, in water being locked up between the embankments.

Moreover, no embankment has yet been built or can be built in future that will not breach. When a breach occurs, there is a deluge. This is what happened at Kusaha this year on the 18th August 2008. 

Proponents of embankments have tried to rationalize the jacketing of rivers thus: Forcing the same quantity of water through a narrow area, as happens in case of an embanked river, increase the water velocity thereby increasing its eroding capacity. The increased velocity of water dredges the river bottom and transports the sediment out preventing the rise of riverbed levels, increasing the carrying capacity of the river and reducing the extent of flooding.

These were the arguments put forward by engineers in independent India when they resorted to massive embanking of rivers in the Ganga and the Brahmaputra basin. Unfortunately, there has been little evidence to date that this theory is actually being substantiated anywhere on Indian rivers. The technical debate, however, continues at that level. 

At the field level in the flooded areas of Bihar, there is a continuing debate on polythene sheets, rice, vegetables, salt, candle and match-boxes etc. How strategic is this deflection of debate that the people discuss keep discussing about sattu (ground gram), chura (flattened rice) candles and matchboxes. This is what precisely the politicians want and if they are not brought to the real issues of dealing with the sediments, floodwaters, accountability and an informed debate; the event would simply pass of as the earlier ones.  

*Convenor – Barh Mukti Abhiyan 
6-B Rajiv Nagar , Patna 800024 Bihar-India 
+919431303360 E-mail: dkmishra108(at)gmail.com 

Dear friends:

You have heard it all; maybe, many times over.
The mighty Koshi river, flowing from the
Himalayan ranges of Nepal and flowing into the
plains of Northern Bihar until it merges with the
Ganges, has burst its man-made barricades and
embankments, and has turned vast areas of Nepal
and India into an ocean of massive misery.
Millions of people turned homeless; a countless
dead, and the suffering continues unabated.

A vast number of well-informed people, including
those who know about rivers and dams, have
pointed out that what we are witnessing is not
really a natural disaster, but fundamentally a
tragedy which is created by the callous,
irresponsible, government of Bihar. It is, once
more, a MAN-MADE tragedy.

We send you some of these reports – for you to go
through and make your own assessment. The first
one, by Analytical Monthly Review, is
particularly useful to get a comprehensive view
of the Koshi River project.

Although the government at various levels have
taken up the job of helping the millions of flood
victims, there is a lot that is needed. We send
you below two links for channeling your material
support, one for Nepal, and the other for India.

And, finally, also appended below is field report
from Medha Patkar on behalf of the National
Alliance for People’s Movements.

Thank you for your time and your support.

hari sharma
for SANSAD

The Making of the 2008 Koshi Disaster
by Analytical Monthly Review

Analytical Monthly Review, published in Kharagpur, West Bengal, India, is a sister edition of Monthly Review.  Its September 2008 issue features the following editorial. — Ed.

We know that the immediate future holds the certainty of severe climate change, and an ever increasing strain on not only the much publicised issue of reserves of fossil fuels but also on the basic vital environmental resource of fresh water.  Nowhere in the world is the margin so slight between the daily life of tens of crores and mass disaster as in the plains and deltas of the Ganges and Brahmaputra.  A storm or a draught, excessive or inadequate rainfall, will have a “natural” cause, but the ensuing disaster — and even more the response — is the product of social practices and historical events.  A clear instance is the flooding of the River Koshi, and the resulting massive disaster over half of Bihar and the Sunsari district of Nepal.  Parts of Assam and Orissa, as well as much of West Bengal and the nation of Bangladesh, also face flooding in almost every monsoon.  Though there may be reasons for events that depend on the unique geography of a sub-region, the common environment and social history entail a shared danger, and require a shared response if ever more terrible disasters are not to overwhelm the region — however remote the prospect of rational social action may appear at the moment.  But first the myth must be demolished that immediately declares the climate event a natural calamity, for which the rulers are not responsible and about which nothing can be done except some temporary relief.

The Koshi River is notorious for its unstable dynamic character, and for its frequent floods.  The river drains the southern face of the Himalaya through the entire eastern third of Nepal, from the Nepal border with Sikkim and the Kanchenjunga massif west to the regions north of the Kathmandu valley.  The Koshi enters Bihar and merges into Ganges.  The steady gradual erosion of the relatively “young” Himal mountain chain occurs throughout the immense fan-shaped drainage basin, and the river Koshi carries a part of this load as sediment.  This sediment is deposited every year in the Nepali Terai and Bihar where the river slows down after racing through the mountain valleys.  As silt accumulates the previous route of the river is blocked, floods result, and the river finds new channels to meet the Ganges.  In historical time the river has moved over great distances; in the last 250 years the Koshi has shifted over a distance of 112 kms from Purnea in the east to Saharsa in the west.  The question of whether or not to try to capture the river within embankments so as to check the shift as well as to control flood became a subject of discussion long before Independence.  It was well understood early in the 20th century that the existence of embankments often increased the adverse effect of floods.  Absent embankments floods were frequent but not severe, the land benefited from the sediment deposited, and housing could be constructed on slightly higher ground (or even on stilts) so as to remain habitable in all but the most severe floods.  The 1937 Bihar Flood Conference centered on the “Embankments versus No embankments” debate.

Two characteristics of the new Indian governing class after Independence set the course that resulted in the Koshi disaster of 2008: the illusory pursuit of development without social revolution by means of gigantic technological projects (such as massive dams), and the imposition of (sub)imperialist control over the Himalayan nations of Nepal, Sikkim, and Bhutan.   In 1950 an ambitious multipurpose project was prepared to moderate floods, generate hydropower, to irrigate land in both India and Nepal, and provide navigation facilities in a reservoir and the river downstream.  The project envisioned that the land to be flooded and the barrages to be built would all be on the Nepal side of the border.  Obtaining agreement from Nepal was obviously a problem, but in 1954 the Nepal government of M.P. Koirala, generally agreed to be the most subservient government to India in the second half of the 20th century, was compelled to sign the Koshi agreement.  The Indians obtained “extraterritorial” rights within Nepal.

The barrage building engineering knowledge was wholly based on rivers of Europe and North America not subject to extensive silting.  And the project was inaugurated in March 1955 by the President of India, who had himself expressed the view in 1937 Bihar Flood Conference that the silt brought down by a river descending from the Himalayan range would be on a scale different from anything experienced elsewhere.  The Koshi was barraged at Bhimnagar on the Nepal-India border, and management entrusted explicitly and exclusively to the Government of Bihar.  Long levees were built on both sides upstream of the barrage to guide the water to the barrage, there to feed two large irrigation canals.  Downstream, another 125 km of embankments were constructed to the south to safeguard eastern Bihar from floods.  For 50 years the Koshi has deposited its silt, which previously had been deposited over a wide region, on its bed between the confining embankments.  As the bed was raised, the embankments were raised as well.  And by a gradual but inexorable process, the Koshi came to flow on what was now a plateau up to five metres higher than the surrounding plains of Terai and Bihar.

As a result of these measures, 386 villages spread across the four districts of Saharsa, Supaul, Madhubani, and Darbhanga, and over eight lakhs of cultivators were trapped within the embankments of the Koshi, whose waters pass over these villages every year at the end of the monsoon.  This is a land of utter misery, lacking electricity, roads, hospitals, cinema house, bank, block, or any other government office.  And outside the embankments the flood control measures have been a total failure.  Eklavya Prasad of Megh Pyne Abhiyan, a recognized expert, has estimated that the flood-prone area of Bihar has tripled since the construction of the Koshi barrage.  The record of the Government of Bihar in maintaining the embankments has been one of scandalous corruption and failure.  Embankments were breached in Dalwa (Nepal) in 1963, Jamalpur (Darbhanga) in 1968, Bhatania (Supaul) in 1971, Bahuarwa (Saharsa) in 1980, Hempur (Saharsa) in 1984, and Joginia (Nepal) in 1991.  For the Bihari politicians the resulting floods were a welcome opportunity for theft and extortion.

On August 18, 2008, and at a time of relatively moderate flow of the Koshi, the embankment was breached in Western Kusaha Panchayat in Nepal.  The Government of Bihar failed to respond, and this time the damage became in all probability irreversible.  The Koshi spilled out of the plateau it had been permitted to build and immediately inundated four Panchayats of Sunsari district in Nepal, with a population of some 35,000.  The river now spread out to the east through Bihar, seeking its old channels on its way to the Ganges.  Blocked on the west from its bed by its towering embankments, and from a direct route to the south by raised roadways, the river created an inland sea.  The Koshi did not break through to the Ganges until well into September.  By this time official sources acknowledged that 35 lakh people have been flooded out, and the true figure is surely far higher.  The response of the Bihar and Union governments has been worse than inadequate, verging on the criminal.  Deaths number in the thousands, and continue in the improvised camps where water and food are scarce, and disease flourishes.  As you can see, neither the flood nor the response were a “natural calamity” but one squarely the result of the acts and omissions of the rulers of India and Bihar over the last fifty years, continuing to this very moment.

In this stench of death and failure of the Indian post-Independence regime, came the first hint of a better future.  Nepal Prime Minister Prachanda said after a visit to Sunsari, one of his first tasks as PM, that the Indo-Nepal Treaty of 1954 was“a historical blunder.”  Indian promises to Nepal in the 1954 Koshi agreement (and its subsequent amendments) of benefits have without exception turned out to be lies.  The irrigated land lies (today submerged) within India, “concessional” electric power is charged for at high rates, payment for Nepali lands submerged or leased has not been made after many decades,  promised roads were not built by India, and maintenance of the embankments — and the embankments themselves — collapsed.  See SB Pun, “Kosi River: From ‘Sorrow of Bihar’ to ‘Sorrow of Nepal?’” Spotlight, Sept 5, 2008.

It is not only the embankments that have been breached, the 1954 Koshi agreement — an unequal treaty if ever there were one — has been breached as well.  Under international law it is now no more than a scrap of paper.  There is no hope for a rational solution to the dramatic challenges of the ecological water crisis from the criminal gang of bourgeois Bihari politicians, from deranged giant dam proponents, from Chidambaram&Co, from the “cross-fire” murdering generals of Bangladesh, or from the gentle hands of the Sangh Parivar.  But Nepal is a necessary participant in any water plan; that is where the rivers commence.  When Prachanda sits down to renegotiate the water treaties he will be representing not only Nepal, but the hopes of all in the region for a better future.  Yet ultimately if we are successfully to manage the looming environmental water disaster it shall require a radical change in the balance of class forces in society in both India and Bangladesh; we can hope that Nepal will light the path.

[An edited, shorter version of this report by me appeared this morning in Sakaal Times.]

Supaul (Bihar) / Sunsari (Nepal): Even as Bihar has ordered a judicial probe into all embankment breaches in the Kosi river since the embankment was built in 1953, water resources minister Vijendra Yadav has blamed Nepal for the August 18 incident.

Yadav has said that the Bihar government was aware of the impending crisis but could not do anything because of lack of cooperation from the Nepalese side. He said that the water resources ministry’s secretary had written a letter to the Indian embassy officials in Nepal, a copy of which had been marked to the irrigation department at the center. He said that on August 14, CM Nitish Kumar had approached external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee requesting him to intervene.

“I did not want to reveal all this earlier because external affairs are under the centre’s jurisdiction but I have been forced to do so because I am being painted as the villain who caused the flood,” he told Sakaal Times.

He listed four reasons to explain how the Nepalese side was responsible. Firstly, embankment repair and flood-fighting work was halted because of a strike by labourers. He said that the strike was instigated by local political elements. At the breach point in Kusaha, however, there were conflicting versions from people about why the strike took place. Some said they were demanding higher wages, some said one group was demanding that no other group be allowed to work, and some said they were striking because they hadn’t been paid wages for five days. One contractor, Babloo Kumar of Surya, who has been hired now to help the public sector company HSCL with the repair work, said that the Bihar government often delayed payments to contractors and water resources department officials used discretionary powers to give contracts to small upstart companies.

Everyone, including local Nepalis, were in agreement with minister Yadav’s contention that flood-fighting was badly hit because Indian officials couldn’t cut trees and work in the night as the area had been decalred a reserved forest. The work was often delayed because officials wouldn’t be given passes to go into the reserved forest, which came up along the embankment India built as per an agreement with Nepal in 1953. “Even the previous water resources minister was once not given permission and had to return,” said Virendra Prasad, the official manning the Kosi barrage at the Indo-Nepal border. Locals there also confirmed that Bihar government officials were often afraid to visit the site for inspection because of the bad law and order situation in Nepal, which has improved drastically.

Prasad also confirmed the allegations that the two engineers had been attacked and firs thus filed. Upstream in Barakshetra, which is the catchment area of the Kosi river, the gauge tower that measures the water discharge, had been brought down by Maoists in May.

“Sharad Yadav, who was invited to Prime Minister Prachanda’s swearing-in on 18 August, had taken up the matter with him, but it was too late,” minister Yadav told Sakaal Times, “The new government in Nepal, however, is giving us all co-operation now.”

When asked about Nepal’s role in the breach, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar told this reporter, “Some questions are answered by time.”

Yadav’s clarifications come in the wake of sever criticism against him from the opposition and local media which blame him for negligence. Union minister of state for water resources, Jai Prakash Narain Yadav, who is from the RJD, has already said that the state government is blaming Nepal to hide its own negligent role, and that it should not have claimed in its daily embankment bulletins that all embankments are safe if they were in the know.

The opposition RJD has also called the judicial probe an eyewash as it does not seek to probe the state’s role in the August 18 floods and divert the attention to all embankment breaches since 1953.

While going through the efforts being put in by many a people, to help people effected by flood recover, it just occured to me: ‘What next?’ 

Right now mobilizing funds, medicines and other relief material is not a diffcult job at all  People are quite sensitive and motivated to come forward to donate whatever they could to help those who are victim of the nature’s fury. money shall reach those poor ones to help them restart their lives even in penury. 

This cycle would continue for another three months or may be six.This would certainly help them re-establish and start their lives with rejuvenation and a past better be forgotten. But would nature let them forget? 

Apart from the loss of dear ones, the basic neccessities would also loom large. Most of those uprooted belong to farmers class. Koshi brings along a lot of Sand as sedimentation which it would leave as parting gift (?) on the arrablelands, making it less fertile. This would result in lesser agricultural production in spite of harder work on the lands. what does it mean for the farmers? Another year of hunger and frustration arising out of inefficieny of the land to produce output for the effort put in. Bihar, as such, is a poor state and its state of affair is highly dependant on agriculture. With no industrial base at all and poor agricultural output, one can very well imagine the plight that is in store for the next season. 

Now what happens if the same flood repeats itself in a year or two (God forbid!)? Can the government guarantee that the same would not be repeated? Do we have any action plan to ensure safety of people from calamity? I hope the government ha soem affirmative answer to this. It is not enough to cure the disease once it occure but is imperative to ensure it does not occur again. Where are the Vacines?

Puja Festivel is round the corner. Durga Puja is being celebrated in Bihar at a large scale. I hope Goddess Durga would have some blessings on the state.

Rehabilitation of the people displaced by flooding in Koshi River in organized camps has begun.

Flood victims have been relocated to the camps set up by the Koshi victims Society, Saptari, with the aid of OXFAM, said Jibachha Mishra, Chief District Officer and Chairman of the Natural Calamities Relief Committee, Saptari.

The flooding in Koshi River displaced 21,140 members of 3,260 families in Pashim Kusaha, Laukahi and Sripur VDCs of Sunsari. The displaced have been living in Bhardaha, Portaha, Yoginiya and in Koshi dam.

Installation of 3,000 temporary camps for the displaced living in Koshi dam is underway rapidly. CDO Mishara said of them, OXFAM aided for 2,500 camps and other organisations are setting up the remaining camps.

The World Food Programme has provided 234 metric tones of food for the displaced.

Similarly, Rural Re-construction is installing 100 toilets and 100 tube-wells and CARE Nepal is doling out utensils, hygiene kit, mats and clothing, the CDO said. “We have already settled some displaced in 250 camps and efforts are underway to rehabilitate the others,” he added.

In Biratnagar, changing its course, 75 per cent water of the Saptakoshi River has begun gushing out through the spur broken area, Natural Calamities Relief Committee, Sunsari has stated.

Water-level in the barrage was 26,508 cusec this morning but around 80,000 cusec water was flowing through the breached area, the Koshi Barrage Control Center said.

According to the information received, Koshi Barrage has the capacity up to 600,000 cusec water; however, the barrage had only 100,000 cusec water on the day the dam was destroyed.

The embankment collapsed not due to the high water level but because it had become fragile, said Rameshwor Khadka, Chief of Water-Induced Disaster Control Office, Biratnagar. The rapid course of the embankment crumbling down has widened to 1,600 meter, Khadka said.

He ruled out the possibility of immediate plugging the embankment and added that construction and repair of spurs to control the further breaching has begun.

Despite slow breaching of the embankment at north, water-flow towards south has increased heightening chances of breaking apart embankment at south, Khadka said.

“Considering the depth and flow of water in the embankment broken area,” said Khadka, “we have concluded that the embankment can not be plugged untill the monsoon gets over.”

Earlier in Bhadrapur, with the Ramchandraahi river continuing to breach the dam, possibility of flood entering some villages in south of Jhapa district is high.

The river swollen due to incessant rainfall since a few days ago has been cutting the embankment rapidly in Khajurgachi-3.

Only two meters of the dam is left to be breached by the river, VDC Secretary Chandra Mohan Ganesh informed.

Ganesh said that once the dam is breached, paddy planted in hundreds of bighas of land will be destroyed and dozens of families will be displaced.

Efforts to control the breaching of the dam have not been made yet.

Meanwhile, flooding in Kankai River has displaced two households in Shivgunj VDC.

                                (Source:Government of Nepal)

Image://cache.boston.com

There can be no sage,
Who can withstand her rage.

Once she decides to change her course,
She unleashes a deadly force.

The surging mountains of water,
Inevitably end in a slaughter.

She spares neither beast nor man,
For she is no ordinary woman.

She may appear to be calm and still,
Until she decides to kill.

Who do you think is this she?
It’s none other than the river Koshi.

[The river Koshi (also spelt as Kosi) is known as the Sorrow of Bihar ]

Sitting far away from Bihar, the feeling for those impacted is still high and the efforts are on to provide help as much as possible.

The first criteria was to make sure that 100% of what is sent is utilised. Hence Government relief fund and unknown NGOs were out of questions.  The channel we know would work the best is sending it out to Batulda, the teacher who is active and is a source of inspiration for many.  this would ensure whatever is collected and sent goes to the needy ones without fail.

Following methods are adopted to help out the impacted people:

1. Send clothes to the relief centres. Being one of the basic necessities, it is not only imperative that this need is fulfilled, but also it is easiest to collect. Transfer however is not such an easy job. Clothes collection has started off well. In our apartment we started Door-to-door campaign, which was  a major success. Loads of clothes have been collected filling almost a dozen cartons. Collection was easy but sending it out is a problem as cost of sending might go over the roof. Searching for the transporters finally resulted in identifying some cheaper option. Though it would take 10-15 days, it is still worth saving some money and spend it on sending more clothes and medicines. TCI came out to be a good option However one of our apartment dweller came forward to take it up as he owns a transport establishment. Let us see how successful this endeavour comes out to be.

2. Medicines are of paramount importance, especially in post-flood situation as the water, while receding leaves out carcass and debris as gift to the impacted ones. This results in spread of diseases and combating it would be the most crucial task on hand. A friend – Jawahar – who works in a pharma company has volunteered to send out some medicines free of cost for this noble purpose.

3. Cash is being collected to be sent to Purnia so that necessary goods can be collected and distributed among those at the relief shelter as well as to them, who could not make it to the relief centres.

Bihar flood Relief effort blog provides details of bank accounts as well as collection points for clothes. I would request everyone to contribute heartily and ensure that the effort becomes successful.

www.BiharFloodRelief.com

Old Proverb said, “Water, water everywhere, not a single drop to drink”! Bihar is currently under grip of the Nature’s fury i.e. flooding. BiharFloodRelief.com is an attempt to look after relief work of Bihar Flood. It will try to force general masses about things desired from Indians whenever this type of situations arise. We want to create a Disaster Management System and Bihar flood is our first project in this direction.
As we all know that nobody can fight with Nature’s fury. So, disaster management is our last resort whenever nature goes against its own predefined rule. Flood, Famine, Cyclone, Earthquake, Wild Fire, Landslide, Twister and Volcano are some of the Natural Disaster. Human beings are also too much. In stead of these natural disasters, they create many man made disaster like Terrorist attack, wars, Communal Violence, Industrial or Transport accident, Pollution and Global Warming.

India is very diverse and progressing country. These types of disaster put brakes in our country’s progress or even went us into past condition. In order to keep the momentum of progress and continuity of life in order, we have to create a successful Disaster Management Model.

Jai Hind, Jai Bharat!

In the morning, a relief seeped in. For the last two days, I was unable to get through to my father. Today when the sleep gave way to the reality, my phone was ringing and it was my father on the other side assuring me that everything is fine.

The water has not yet flown into my city though it is just like knocking at the door. Places not more than 20 KM away from my house are full of water and the flood is all set to capture more and more land under it. so many villages are under water and so many people left homeless at the mercy of God and the government. The endeavour of the people facing wrath of Kosi is all that is left to make them see the light at the end of the tunnel.

My parents are not budging in to my demand of leaving Purnia and coming over here. Instead they are getting ready to fight the tough time. Arrangements are beging made on the roof so that more and more people from relatives and neighbours can be accomodated and God Forbid, if Purnia gets flooded, at least shelter can be arranged on the roof. Plastic and tarpaulin sheets are being tied up to work as a temporary roof, mattress to be spread on the roof to let as many people sleep on it as possible.

Among all these, the news of further rain is creating a sense of fear. All eyes are glued onto the Television hoping to hear some good news. Hoping to hear that Kosi has finally satiated itself with the calamity. Hoping that the engineers have finally overtaken the dam and have conquered over devastating river or hopping that government has taken some concrete steps to counter the tragedy.

All that one hears these days is allegation and counter allegation of the politicians. In between these political hopeless games, a set of promises and news of some action gives a sense of relief.

Koshi inundation issue should be internationalized

Nepal’s border expert, Buddhi Narayan Shrestha said that the unequal Koshi project agreement between Nepal and India should be either reviewed or chalked a new agreement. The problem, emerged after the breach of Koshi spurs and embankment, must be made as a matter of international debate, he opined.

Making his views at a program organized by the Mirmire Club in the capital on Friday, 22 August 2008, Shrestha further said, it has to formulate a provision of joint operation of the Koshi barrage by the personnel of both Nepal and India for its management and administration.

 At present, all the activities to operate the barrage are under the unilateral control of India. He pointed out that existing system has to be changed and addressed immediately, so that it may not invite such catastrophe again, as it was damaged two spurs and embankment on 18 August by the swollen river Koshi this time.                                   

Shrestha claimed that the problem emerged by the Koshi river this time is not a natural calamity, but a man made problem, not opening the sufficient number of sluice gates. Since India had taken the responsibility for the construction, management and operation of the barrage for 199 years, all the problems disrupted through it must be borne by India.

He added, there are 56 sluice gates in the Koshi barrage. Only 27 gates have been opened and operated during the time of high flow of water, when the incident took place. It shows that India adopted a policy to save their land from flooding, but to inundate the Nepali territory. Had it been opened 50 to 54 sluice gates, there should not have occurred this havoc in Nepal. 

He emphasized that recently formed government of Nepal must put forward to India government without any hesitation, concerning the existing unequal treaties with India, including Koshi agreement.

Border expert Shrestha mentioned that 50 thousand Nepali nationals got into trouble due to the negligence of India not maintaining and repairing Koshi barrage for the last fifty four years. 

Border knowledgeable person Fannindra Nepal said, heart of Nepali people has disregarded India, after the Koshi barrage embankment breached. India must pay the compensation of the damaged Nepalese life and property to Nepali people.

In the programme Bhim Acharya, a leader of Nepal Communist Party (UML) said, Koshi agreement defies all international norms. Koshi is not at all an agreement, Nepal has been betrayed by India while signing the agreement. He mentioned that Nepal has been cheated in the Koshi agreement done between Nepal and India. It should be reformed andamended.    

Jip Chhiring Lama, a NC leader said, the Sunsari floods are not at all natural, it was in fact a surprise gift to the Nepali citizens by their Indian neighbors. The problem created by Koshi barrage damaged embankment should be resolved with a long term view.

“The Nepalese people must unit to fight against this Indian hegemony. We need to fight to preserve our nationalism and break all the illegally built embankments by the India side along the Nepal-India border”, Lama concluded.

(Source: Gorkhapatra Daily and Telegraph Weekly, 2008-08-23)

Many flood victims are suffering from diseases

Nearly 30,000 people are reported to have fled their homes after a dam collapsed in south-eastern Nepal leading to flooding in the area.

The police say they are trying to rescue the stranded people, but the high water levels are making airlifting them difficult.

The Koshi dam on the Saptakoshi river in Sunsari district collapsed on Monday afternoon after breaching embankments.

Many flood victims have taken shelter in school and college buildings.

The police say at least three people have drowned in the floods.

A number of villages have been inundated, a police officer said. “People stranded on the roofs of their houses are being rescued by boat rescue teams,” he added.

Traffic on a highway linking eastern Nepal with its western part has been affected after flood waters damaged a section of the road.

Many of the flood victims who are suffering from diarrhoea and fever have been taken to the district hospital, a police official said.

About 28 million people were affected by the floods in India, Bangladesh and Nepal last year, in which more than 400 people died.

*Muere de felicidad* OMG! Menos mal que me dio por mirarlo, porque no he podido quedarme más feliz. Y es que ambos grupos han sacado o están por sacar cosas.

Primero empezaremos por los veteranos B’z. Este 2 de Julio pusieron a la venta “B’z The best ULTRA pleasure” Como ya viene siendo costumbre con el grupo tenemos un recopilatorio en dos CD de las mejores canciones  del grupo incluyendo también las más recientes. También como es costumbre se llama best algo relacionado con pleasure; en este caso Best ULTRA pleasure. Los dos discos cuentan con 15 canciones cada uno y podremos escuchar temas míticos como: Lady Navigation, Ultra soul, Be there, love me I love you, etc y algunas de las más nuevas como Super Love Song.

Por otra parte Mr.Children vuelve a la carga con nuevas canciones. Por orden de aparición tenemos que este 30 de Julio se pondrá a la venta un nuevo single del grupo que se llamará Gift y la canción estará enfocada hacia los juegos de Beijing.

Gift (tracklist & cover):

1- Gift
2- Okodanhodo wo wataru Hitotachi
3- Kaze to Hoshi to Moebius no wa (instrumental)

Para terminar, el 3 de Septiembre de este mismo año, se prevé (según Yesasia) que el grupo saque otro single que se llamará Hanabi y que de momento tiene una portada y tracklist desconocido (cosa que es lógica).