Assam had hardly recovered from two successive waves of floods, with farmers trying to make up for their losses by planting a late variety of paddy, when a third and even more devastating wave of floods struck, wiping out almost every sapling. It has been an enormous loss, and this third wave will leave behind a trail of destruction that will have a deep and long-lasting impact on the state’s economy even as the Brahmaputra and its numerous tributaries continues to flow above the high-water mark.

Floods have remained a scourge in this region since 1950, when a devastating earthquake not only raised the bed of the Brahmaputra but also changed its course. As if the floods were not bad enough, last year the state had its first brush with drought. Consequently Assam, which had in 2001 recorded its maiden surplus output of rice, has since slipped again, with agriculture — the mainstay of its rural economy — being very badly hit.

Last year’s drought taught Assam a lesson: never to neglect irrigation imperatives. In fact the state has an installed capacity that could irrigate an estimated 25 per cent of its 24.90 lakh hectares of net cropped area. Yet, when the drought struck, it was found that hardly eight per cent of the area could be provided with the necessary irrigation, because most of the existing infrastructure had remained unmaintained for years.

With the recent floods, the state has made a new discovery: the entire flood control infrastructure — embankments, bunds, spurs and drainage systems — was faulty and outdated. The geo-dynamics of floods seems to have undergone drastic changes over the past few years. Large-scale deforestation, massive earthwork on a series of dam projects in Arunachal Pradesh and Bhutan as well as encroachment on the Brahmaputra flood plains have together changed the very character of floods in the region.

... contd.