Q. write a report (in approximately 300 words) with the title – Floods in Chennai.
Base the report on the points given below–
Date and place – cause of floods – disruption of road and rail traffic – rescue operations – financial loss – prime minister's visit and remarks – president's message.
(you may also include other relevant details).
Answers
Answer:
Essay on Chennai Flash Floods
Chennai, India had experienced record-breaking rains and flooding since early November. Beginning on 1 December, the rain intensified again creating more flooding and causing thousands of people to be stranded and trapped. An estimated 188 people had died, and over 200,000 had been displaced. Earlier in the week 3500 were stranded at Chennai Airport. Recent reports estimate it to be approximately 700.
The Chennai floods have thrown up some fundamental flaws in our system of urban planning. Across India, city after city has experienced floods, while some others live with the fear of impending disasters. In Mumbai, flooding was caused by wrong developments at the Bandra estuary and negligence along the Mithi river, and in Uttarakhand the disaster was caused by unplanned regional development and the unholy nexus between the land mafia and politicians.
The Srinagar valley suffers from an unfortunate geographical disadvantage of being the recipient of water from an enormous watershed above the valley. Meanwhile, in Delhi, the two governments are merrily building on the city’s flood plains, ignoring the ministry of environment, which is supposed to protect the Delhi Ridge and the Yamuna river. Calcutta’s new growth is entirely in the wetland area, creating multiple infrastructure barriers for surface water flow from the mother city, which in any case has a lower elevation than the Hooghly river.
In the past decades, Bangalore’s expansion had been at the cost of an elaborate pond system in the sub-region, a majority of the scattered ponds being built upon by land sharks. The Bruhat Bangalore Development Plan came too late, while artificial land values were created by project-driven infrastructure. In other words, all our metropolitan cities have ignored watershed management and environmental planning to their own peril.
This is the juncture in India’s urbanisation when thousands of crores are being poured into the urban centres, coupled with a policy shift in the Environmental Impact Assessment in order to facilitate ‘growth’ for easing the sanction process. All these are also ‘Smart Cities’, ‘AMRUT Cities’ and investment destinations for ambitious metro projects and they are identified as new growth centres of our ‘surging’ economy.
In the absence of a proper National Policy for Urbanisation, our metropolitan cities are sitting ducks for all sorts of natural disasters. Spineless local planning organisations, which are subservient to their administrative and political masters, are not willing to put their technical know-how on the table, for fear of punishment transfers and mafia-induced pressures.
The Chennai floods show all these problems can surface in other Indian cities. The geography of South India demonstrates how rivulets, ponds, streams and rivers emanating from the Eastern Ghats flow towards the East to the Tamil Nadu coast. On the other hand, this coast is also highly vulnerable to storms, depression, tsunami and floods.
Chennai is one such area where an enormous watershed finally drains into the sea through its rivers and canals. Has any regional planning exercise recognised this primary natural layer on which urban development forms the secondary layer? No. On the contrary, the watershed on the west of Chennai has been the major venue for industrialisation in corridors going up to Kanchipuram further to the west.