A four-year old girl speaking on the importance of tree

Reminiscence of 1950's Assam Earthquake and Subansiri's flood

MONOJ GOGOI APR 13, 2013: It was the morning of August 15, 1950. While the entire country was celebrating the 3rd Independence Day of India, the earth shook suddenly in the northeast region. It was an earthquake at a magnitude of 8.7 in the Richter scale which created indelineable devastation at several parts of the region. In that earthquake, in a massive landslide occurred in the hills near Dulungmukh, the Subansiri, a principal north bank tributary of the Brahmaputra was entirely blocked. Due to the blockade the water level receded largely in the downstream and the river bed almost dried up. Though the people saw the landslides from the downstream, they did not know the actual reason behind the drying up of the river. The riverine people gladly became busy in fishing in the swallow stagnant water of the river. The government tried to warn the people by distributing leaflets using helicopter about the blockade of the river and the possible impending disaster, but the p...

Saving Assam's Communities: A Scientific Approach to Riverbank Erosion

MONOJ GOGOI The riverbank erosion is one of the major problems in Assam. The riparian community in the Brahmaputra basin in Assam has been bearing the brunt of erosion for decades. They lose properties, houses, homestead land and agricultural lands to erosion. The riverbank erosion, sometimes, engulfs even an entire settlement or village and thus displaces thousands of people annually in the state. According to a report, the state has already lost more than 4.27 ha of land to the erosion caused by the Brahmaputra and its tributaries. There is no any mantra or strategy to stop suddenly the increasing trend of the erosion but scientific studies like “Mapping riverbank erosion and assessing it's impact on socio-economy and livelihood of people in selected villages in Lakhimpur and Majuli district: A case study for sustainable policy intervention to improve disaster and climate resilience of vulnerable communities”, prepared by Partha J Das (lead author) and Arup Kr. Das (remot...

LOW YIELD OF BETEL NUTS HITS RURAL ECONOMY IN ASSAM THIS YEAR

MONOJ GOGOI It's the harvesting period of betel nut or supari (areca nut) in Assam. But the yield of betel nuts is discernibly low this year in all the districts of Assam compared to previous years. Chandan Boro, who plucks betel nuts, with Ranjit Basumatary and Raju Basumatary in this season in various villages under Gogamukh revenue circle of Dhemaji district in Assam says that in this harvesting season of betel nuts they are not getting as much works as they did in previous years. He says in the orchards where we plucked 20 quintals last year, this year's yield in the same orchard is less than 5 quintals. In many trees not even a single nut is found and in which trees nuts are there, it's comparatively very few. Ranjit Basumatary says we are roaming from village to village but the situation is the same. "We are shocked to see the drastic change in the crop yields", he adds. Biren Pegu, a betel nut grower from Goroimari are...

CLIMATE CARE - NORTHEAST INDIA

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