4th visit in pix & videos - PART 1

Chargheri Trip 4 dated 25-07-2009, Part 1 of 2:
[The relevant picture or video is followed by the description]

Explaining HSI to Saptarshi
The history of Help Sunderbans Initiative (HSI) till date is explained to Saptarshi

01 hightide water level outside dykes

This sight is common to almost all areas of Sunderbans during the high tide. The inhabited land inside is lower than the high tide level and protected by earthen dykes. Hundreds of kilometres of these dykes were breached by furious Aila on 25th May 2009.

02 Boat enters Changheri through breached dyke

Our boat leaves Garal River and enters Chargheri territory, into an area which used to be a farmland.



03 Area lost to river

In this video, the boat enters an estuarine part of the village that used to be a farmland before Aila happened. Now this is an extension of the river. The new dyke is getting built a few hundred metres inside the old damaged dyke.

This entry of boat through dyke and straight sailing to the distribution area is possible only during high tide. The high tide was already receding when we reached. The boat had to be unloaded quickly and navigated to deeper waters of Garal to ensure we did not get stranded till the next high tide.


04 broken dykes of Chargheri

This video shows the remnants of the old dyke of Chargheri on Garal river. It was destroyed by Aila.


05 Another video of the area lost to river

This is another video where Kaustuv shows to Saptarshi the areas outside the new dyke, of Chargheri, all of which was farmland. Saptarshi is our friend from IBM. He was visiting first time.


06 Pumps operating on new dyke

This video shows the land inside dykes being emptied by pumps operating on them. This is done with the purpose of emptying accumulated water from farmland inside the dyke. It is the first step towards getting the land back to cultivability.

This is the first step towards of landmark of desalination. Pumping is being done by the dyke repairing contractor employed by administration.


07 Destination Chargheri draws near

The boat reaches Chargheri and we alight very close to the distribution point.


8 The lowtide access of Chargheri from Garal River, inundated in high tide

The area in the video here (first 5-6 secs) becomes subnerged in the river in high tide . This is what we see here. But when the tide wanes it becomes the access path from the Garal river (see next pic).


The same area outside dyke, but in low tide

This picture from 1st trip shows the same access area in low tide



09 Unloading at Distribution point

The distribution point, and unloading rice bags from boat to stack them up there


11 People waiting near the distribution point

They are waiting for unloading to finish and issue of their allocated quota of rice.

Another boat carrying another group

A corporate group arrives on the same day through Green Camp. They distribute a few things to the locals (polythenes, lamps, a small quantity of rice, biscuits etc). They distribute the food materials under the issue system employed by us and we have no problems in accomodating them. However due to lack of prior information the distribution for their non-food materials, done independently from us, goes a little haywire in the end. The first time is always difficult in these areas, and some information, detailing and planning is required to make the distribution equitable. It is not known to us if they wish to come back regularly or it is a one time effort. We will learn later. We only hope that more groups can come, as we know that we are not supplying not even nearly the full quota needed.

12 New dyke under construction

The first thing we notice is that the dyke has grown noticeably bigger than what it was during my first visit on June 28th (see next pic)

A comparative picture of the dyke work progress

The progress of dyke work is visible in the above comparative picture, where the dyke size as on June 28th (trip 1) can be compared with the dyke size on 25th July (trip 4).

[contunued in part 2]