Indian villagers return after floods

Up to 15,000 villagers in Eastern India return to their homes as flood waters in the area begin to recede.

Some villagers began trying to return to their flooded homes in eastern India today as waters slowly receded, but officials warned the move was risky with a month of heavy rains still expected. Almost 900,000 people have been evacuated to higher ground since flood defence walls broke upstream in Nepal almost three weeks ago, shifting the flow of the Kosi river away from its normal course and east onto farmland.

Large swathes of the impoverished state of Bihar were flooded. About 100,000 people remain marooned in village islands by the river, with most refusing to leave, while some evacuees are trying to head home. "We have reached a stage where people in the thousands are still left, but they are now refusing to come out," said Pratyaya Amrit, a state disaster management official. "People think the flood is over. In a lot of the camps people have started moving back. In the last two to three days, at least 10,000 to 15,000 have gone back."

But India's monsoon season, when much of the country receives more than 90 per cent of its rain, does not end till the close of September, and officials say the river could rise again. About 1,100 square kilometres of villages and farms remain underwater, even though levels have decreased by 30 cm or more in parts. In areas surrounding Birpur town, on the border with Nepal, a photographer accompanying an Air Force relief flight said more than 80 per cent of the area was under water.

On Saturday, some 2,000 people could still be seen sheltering on rooftops and dry strips of land, waving to the helicopter for emergency food supplies. The helicopter was dropping red and orange water-resistant packages containing beaten rice, lentil flour, palm sugar and water purifying tablets, a relief official said, adding that the relief sorties would be reduced Sunday. "Right now we have nine helicopters," Deepak Kumar Sahu, an official co-ordinating flood relief efforts said.

"Tomorrow we'll withdraw two. The focus is on the evacuation and the rehabilitation camps." Army officials running boat rescue operations this week said the receding water was making it harder to reach distant villages, where people have been without food or water for weeks. "Beyond 15 to 20km it is hard for us rescue," said one army official, asking not to be named. "We're trying to get as far as possible."

But with frequent stops to pull boats across shallow sections of water, they can only get as far as nearby villages where people want to stay put, asking instead for supplies to be sent to them. On a road in Bihar's Purnia district, 350km from state capital Patna, rescued villagers unloaded from boats trudged towards the town and camps all week. But as reports circulated that water levels were falling, just as many villagers were walking the other way, to check how much water was on either side of the road and decide what to do next.

With camps running out of room for the tens of thousands of people who have left their homes, many of the freshly evacuated villagers are living on the road. But local administrative officials say new camps were being set up and more medical teams were being deployed. "We're increasing capacity by putting up tented accommodation," said Purnia's top administrative official C Sridhar. "Some people who are coming with cattle are setting up on the side of the road. We are persuading them to move towards camps."

*AFP