How many disasters will Runa bear?

Sometime ago, a conversation with Manu Gupta and Anshu Sharma, co-founders of SEEDS, the NGO that develops disaster resilience in some of the country’s most vulnerable communities, got me thinking. The last few months have once again made it amply clear that we as a country aren’t prepared for any, let alone multiple, disasters. And without disaster-resilient civic infrastructure, how is the general populace expected to be atmanirbhar or self-reliant? I spoke with Runa Ghorai of Biramput village in West Bengal’s Medinipur district to find out. Ghorai and her family sell fish for a living and are reeling from the twin impacts of the Covid-19 lockdown and cyclone Amphan, one of the worst to make landfall in their part of the world.

The lockdown has been hard on Ghorai and her community. “The lockdown caused markets to close and we couldn’t sell fish anymore,” she said. Overnight, her household income dropped from about Rs 200 a day to zero. Relief in the form of free foodgrain from the state government and ration/hygiene kits from SEEDS and other NGOs kept starvation at bay. Then came Amphan.

“We knew it was coming but nothing prepared us for the screaming winds and rain that instantly flattened our home and destroyed my little vegetable patch,” she said. “My husband took our elder two daughters while I grabbed the youngest one and picked up whatever important documents I could find.” The family made their way to a concrete house nearby where dozens of families were already sheltering. “My husband and a bunch of member directed everyone to put on masks and requested families to huddle together while somehow maintain social distance from one another,” she said. They sheltered there for hours, long after the cyclone had passed. “I tried to pray but all I could think of was,” she said, “what would get us first — coronavirus or the cyclone.”

Later, the family discovered that the roof and mud walls of their kuccha house were severely damaged. They returned to their broken home as there were no relief camps nearby. When we spoke, Ghorai’s husband had gone out to forage for plastic to cover the roof as it has been raining incessantly. “Most of our belongings like the TV my father gifted us, are destroyed,” she said. “What’s left is sopping wet and I’m afraid that being so cold and wet might make us vulnerable to infection.”

Ghorai and her community are a long way from atmanirbharnta, self-reliance. “It’s been nine days since the markets opened,” she said. “But without customers, I’ve barely earned about Rs 500 selling fish,” she said. “We’ve no money to repair our house.” They continue to depend on relief. Meanwhile, sleep still eludes Ghorai at night. “I recall the strange hues of the sea before the cyclone came, which I’d never seen before,” she said. “I remember  the howling wind and wonder how many more disasters am I expected to survive?” During the day, as she sells fish in a silent market, she worries about her children’s future.

After our conversation, the plight of Runa Ghorai hung heavy on my heart. Till we build better infrastructure to deal with disasters, people like her will continue to need relief as well as money transfers to survive. The last thing they need are lectures on self-reliance.