The victims of the Mundakkai and Chooralmala disaster have two urgent wishes. One, they want to live together like they have done before tragedy struck. Two, there should be an early warning system that caters to the disaster-prone areas of Wayanad district.
The survivors stated this at the session on 'Wayanad: Voices from the Ravaged Land', one of the first discussions held as part of Manorama Hortus, the three-day art and literature festival that began on Friday, November 1.
"Now the tragedy has scattered us. We want all of us to be brought together so that we can live like we used to," said Noufal Mundakkai, a survivor who had lost his family, including his wife, child, parents and sisters. "Everyone should have a house and live together," Noufal said. He said the fraternal bonds in Chooralmala and Mundakkai were so strong that people had always preferred to marry from within the community. "My two sisters were married to men from this area," Noufal said.
Noorudeen CK, the ward member of Chooralmala ward of Meppadi panchayat, had just one request, which he made with a lump in his throat. "Many of us have been dispersed to various parts of the district (The survivors have been shifted to rented houses in other parts of Wayanad.). Wherever they are, I want the government to acquire land on a war footing and bring all of us together," Noorudeen said.
Kalpetta MLA T Siddique said that people of the affected areas have a "high bondage of an amazing quality". "They should not be left scattered far away from their lands," he said.
The Kerala government's plan is to find lands closest to the disaster area and acquire them using the extraordinary Disaster Management Act 2005 provisions. Two swathes of land have been
identified for the proposed township: 65.47 hectares of Nedumpala Estate at Kottappady Village and 78.37 hectares of Elston Estate in Kalpetta Village. However, these two lands have been caught up in legal tangles.
Siddique said that the government should hold urgent talks with the estate management.
Early warning system, please
The absence of a credible warning system in a district that natural disasters have consistently ravaged was the other big nightmare for the survivors. "We need an early warning system. We have not been able to shed our fear of the rain," said Manoj J J, the convenor of the action council of survivors. "There is a Doppler radar system at Pulpally (Wayanad), but we don't know whether this will be of any use to people in Meppadi (the most disaster-prone area)," Manoj said.
Siddique said that the only rain gauge system in Wayanad was at Ambalavayal. The problem with Ambalavayal is that it is in a rain shadow region, where rainfall is scanty. "You cannot measure Wayanad's rainfall with the data from Ambalavayal," Siddique said.
On top of it, even this data is hard to get. "I had to pay Rs 1000 to secure rainfall data from Ambalavayal station," the MLA said. Even ISRO has not shared the satellite map of the region. Ironically, NASA has provided the same data.
"Please don't push our people into more tragedies. Install an early warning system for us as soon as possible," Noorudeen said.
Need for finality
The survivors also want the search for missing people to continue. It is said that 47 bodies are yet to be found. Siddique said that the search for bodies and body parts had virtually stopped on August 13, the day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited. "At my insistence, the government resumed the search, and we found seven body parts," Siddique said.
Noufal, who had lost his entire family, said that if it was hard to recover bodies, the government should at least provide the living ones with the necessary papers and documents. We need a finality," Noufal said.
Siddique said that if the government feels that continuing the search would be futile, as it would not lead to a DNA match, it should convince the people why it had to stop the search.
Official figures show that 124 people had gone missing. Rajan said 77 of the 124 could be identified from 155 body parts. Now, officially, 47 bodies remain to be discovered.
