Record rain in Meghalaya behind Sylhet floods

Flood is recurrent in Bangladesh due to its geographical characteristics. Obviously heavy rain also causes floods. Sylhet has been hit by flood twice this year and both are severe. Such a severe flood is unusual in the month of May. However, it just happened this time. One of the main reasons for the flood this time is the rains due to the cyclone Asani. The cyclone moved through the Odisha region of India. The circulation of the cyclone created excessive humidity over the Meghalaya region. There was heavy rain as an impact of this, which caused the flood in Sylhet in May. And now the monsoon has become active. Rains in the hills are common at this time. Water vapour gets obstructed by the hills and goes upward and gets condensed. And later the vapour turns into raindrops.

The water in Meghalaya comes to the haor regions. Haors are like bowls where water accumulates. Later, it falls into the Bay of Bengal via the Meghna river.

The infrastructures being constructed in the haor regions are not causing this flood. However, it will stretch the duration of the flood. The infrastructures should be submersible. Some roads have been constructed in the haor regions, especially the road in Mithamoin has drawn a lot of attention. But this is not the only reason behind the flood this time. The government now is talking about constructing flyovers, which is an untimely decision I believe. It would have been better if it was done before. However, in case of communication between two upazilas in the haor region, there is no other way than the construction of roads on many occasions. However, the infrastructure should be constructed as per the needs of the area. In some places, infrastructures should be submersible and while in other places flyovers will be more appropriate.

I would say the preparation was not complete. Probably, we couldn’t even imagine such a severe flood. The food storages have been damaged by the flood this time. Therefore, it is clear that these infrastructures are not flood-resistant.

On the other hand, although it was forecasted, we probably did not even think of such a heavy rain. We have some reputation in disaster management. However, our disaster management system is more effective in saving lives than saving properties.

For the flood forecast, we may extend our collaboration with international agencies, especially with agencies in India. This must be done as the two countries are in the same basin. There are questions as to how much of this is done.

I have already said the food storages have been damaged due to the flood. The flood related risk factors should be considered while constructing important infrastructures like power substations. We need to realise that we are passing through the process of climate change. Therefore, we must have long term planning for the construction of infrastructure. We have to take climate change related risk factors into account. This is reality. We will face more severe losses in future if we ignore this. And regarding the preparations, I must say it was not enough.

We can talk about two types of preparations. The first one is the infrastructural preparation. This includes dam, dredging, diversion, and construction of switch-gate. And other initiatives include advance notice as well as the construction of flood shelters at a higher rate. Crop insurance for floods can be an initiative. And there should be a massive initiative in exchanging information with neighbouring countries. And in many cases, the government does not have inter-ministerial coordination. That must be increased. We need to increase people's involvement. We experienced catastrophic floods in 1988 or 1998. The cooperation of the people there was outstanding. But that has decreased a lot. Initiative must be taken to engage more people.