Double blow to Bihar: Earthquake, storms bring villagers to their knees

HailstormS and cyclonic storm affected over 19 lakh farmers in the state. (Source: PTI Photo)

Uday Kumar (20) was not at home when the earthquake hit. One of the two rooms of his house in Darbhanga district’s Chipalia hamlet collapsed and his father Nandkishore Yadav (60) escaped only because he was in the other room. And Kumar, on his way back after visiting one of his sisters, fell from the bike due to the tremors and suffered head injury.

In fact, the year has been a bad one for Bihar. Even as farmers counted their losses due to hailstorms in March-April, a cyclonic storm hit on April 21, killing 59. The earthquake came four days later: a total of 58 people have died in either the main quake or aftershocks, while 275 have been injured.

According to the state’s disaster management department, 1,067 houses partially collapsed in the quake while 113 have been destroyed completely and 66 huts got damaged.

Binda Devi (70) of Dagarsam village died while getting out of the house during tremors. A portion of the balcony of her single-storeyed house fell on her head, killing her instantly. It has already been a bad year for her landowning family with their wheat crop decimated by the hailstorm. “We had harvested 60 quintals from seven acres last year. This time, we barely managed 5.5 quintals,” said her son Jagdish Sahu. Farmers do not venture to estimate the potential losses to their mango crop, which they say is “75 per cent” damaged.

Most deaths in Bihar due to the earthquake were scattered in its northern region close to Nepal. Hari Thakur (65) of Bahadurpur block died on Monday evening when aftershocks hit the region. “My wife and children ran out of the house. My father was sitting near the house and tried to escape from collapsing walls. He tripped on some bamboo and fell, suffering a head injury,” said Hari Thakur’s son Jagannath Thakur . The Thakurs are landless.

Nandkishore Yadav, on the other hand, has suffered crippling losses as a sharecropper. “I have had to spend money out of my pocket to make nothing at all,” he said. Landless, Yadav works on a hectare-sized plot owned by an upper caste owner in the village and gives the landowner half his harvest. Last year, he had harvested 14 quintals of wheat.

Bihar, which is still surveying damage from the cyclonic storm, lost more than 13 lakh hectares of agricultural crop to the hailstorm. Both weather disturbances affected over 19 lakh farmers.

“The government has released Rs 416 crore of the Rs 1,764 crore relief it announced. From the reports coming in, I believe we will end up spending over Rs 2,000 in compensation,” said Vyasji, principal secretary in the department of disaster management.

Source:: Indian Express