Tuesday | 14 January 2025 | Reg No- 06
বাংলা
   
Tuesday | 14 January 2025 | Epaper

Flood water management: An inevitable solution for downstream Bangladesh  

Published : Tuesday, 27 August, 2024 at 12:00 AM  Count : 1285
MIR MOSHARREF HOSSAIN PAKBIR
Since August 21, Bangladesh has been dealing with the aftermath of a terrible flood that mostly affected the northeastern region of the nation. Due to its location on the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (GBM) Delta, the nation is among the most flood-prone regions on Earth. Bangladesh is also situated downstream of a number of significant rivers that start in the Himalayas and run into the Bay of Bengal in the region. There are several local, regional, and international factors that contribute to the nation's nearly annual catastrophic flooding. To deal with this natural disaster, we truly need to concentrate on flood water management as floods will continue emerging in the future also.

In only one day, at least ten districts in Bangladesh were submerged due to intense rainfall in both upstream and downstream areas, as well as mountain runoff. The prolonged downpour in Bangladesh, Assam, Meghalaya, and Tripura of India significantly contributed to the unexpected flood. In just two days, the rainfall in all of these locations has nearly surpassed the previous August average. The flood has damaged 36,45,552 and left 586,040 households stranded in 65 Upazilas in 10 districts. Although 20 people are known to have died in the flood, the number might rise sharply in the following days due to forecasts of further intense rain in August. Young people and others from all social classes have kindly donated to help the flood victims. Our current relief operations must continue because the effects of the recent floods will last for at least three months. Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the Chief Advisor, is also directing NGOs to raise money.

Bangladesh is downstream of 54 shared rivers, whereas our neighbor India is upstream. Bangladesh is situated geographically far lower than the several Indian states from whence the common rivers flow. Bangladesh shares a border of 4,096 km with India and has a sea border of 580 km. Different Indian bordering states like; West Bengal has a maximum height of 3,636 meters, Assam is 1,960 meters, Meghalaya is 1,965 meters, Mizoram is 2,210 meters, and Tripura is 9,00 meters. Sikkim's greatest height is 8,585 meters. However, the majority of Bangladesh lies below 15 meters above sea level, with the capital Dhaka being barely 4 meters above the surface with nation's highest peak at 1,045 meters. In addition, the Brahmaputra River is 5,300 meters upstream and the Ganges River is 3,892 meters upstream. As a result, Bangladesh is facing an uncontrollable downstream waterflow. 

Furthermore, because of the sea's backwater effect, Bangladesh's low-lying areas are seeing longer floods and larger flooded areas as a result of global warming's effects on sea level rise. Bangladesh may face a higher danger of flooding as a result of the Ganges and Brahmaputra flowing more quickly due to the acceleration of glacier melting on the Himalaya-Tibetan Plateau.

Due to reports that the Dumbur dam, constructed on the Gumti river, was opened by Indian authorities, many are blaming India for the most recent floods. However, they refuted the accusation and asserted that the dam's gates opened automatically as the water level hit a particular threshold. The experts from Bangladesh also agreed that excessive rainfall brought on by climate change was the real cause of the floods.

As a countermeasure, many are proposing to build a dam on the Bangladeshi side, but it is not a sensible idea. It is impossible to construct a dam high enough to withstand the upstream waterflow from the Himalayas. Additionally, during monsoon, we will need to open the gates of our own dam due to heavy water pressure. Furthermore, the counter dam will create a sizable water basin between the two dams, putting strain on them both and bringing significant ecological and economic challenges.

A combination of national, regional, and global factors has led to the current flood catastrophe. The primary global driver is climate change, which has several implications, including heavy and unexpected rainfall. Sea level rise brought on by climate change also slows down river water flow into the ocean. This might be critical for the seaside districts of Feni and Noakhali in future. The reason for the regional drivers is that almost 90% of the water that flows through Bangladesh's rivers comes from outside, primarily from India.

Bangladesh possesses the best control over domestic drivers. Bangladesh needs to adopt Open approach rather than the Cordon approach, which is being used since 1950s, to rivers. The Open approach permits rivers to overflow over the floodplains during the rainy season, whilst the Cordon approach aims to restrict rivers by building embankments to their courses exclusively. As a result, floodplains can act as an extra channel for river water to flow to the sea and can receive sedimentation, which elevates the area.

With the Open method, additional areas may be used to confine floods, lessening their fury, while yet gaining access to new, productive territories. It may even expand the territory of our nation. Furthermore, for flood water management, we need to ensure regular dredging of rivers and proper management of silt, reduce the construction of ineffective dams that create new routes for overflowing water, ensure forestation, improve flood forecasting and early warning systems, invest in resilient infrastructure such as flood embankments, drainage systems, and flood shelters, and preserve and create new water reservoirs. We have seen construction of several unplanned embankments, which involved huge corruption in the past and such practice needs to stop. Recently Musapur sluice gate at Companyganj, Noakhali was damaged due to heavy water pressure. Hence, we need to look for sustainable solution.

Cooperation among Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Bhutan can also improve information exchange, cooperative planning, and coordinated flood response. The 1997 UN Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses, which prohibits a nation from interfering in shared rivers without the approval of other co-riparian nations, must be signed by the government of Bangladesh. We hope the Syeda Rizwana Hasan, a well-known environmentalist, who is in charge of the water ministry in the interim administration would sign the 1997 UN agreement at earliest.

Furthermore, it's critical to provide communities the authority to develop locally relevant adaptation strategies. In the past, our predecessors preserved food and seeds for later use, protecting them from the destructive effects of water and floods. In order to conserve food items and planting seeds when the floods pass, we must return to these methods. New agricultural technology that takes use of floodwater potential must be adopted.

We need to revive the thousands of canals, which are illegally grabbed and filled throughout the country. Due to their interests, political governments cannot regain those canals but the interim government can ensure such drive for water management. Moreover, we have destroyed our water reservoirs from even before our independence and regaining those water reservoirs as well as creating new ones will remain of critical importance. 

The Modhumoti Model Town, which was being built without following RAJUK's directives and filling up the sub-flood flow zone close to Amin Bazar, was the subject of a 2004 petition filed by the Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association (BELA). In 2024, they also submitted another petition against filling the major flood zone, reservoir, and agricultural zone at Borobordeshi Mouja that were noted in the Detailed Area Plan (DAP). In both cases, they obtained an order supporting their petition. Now that Syeda Rizwana Hasan, the Chief Executive of BELA, holds two significant ministries related to the environment, she can renew efforts to clear out all of the moujas that are next to flood and sub-flood zones.

As natural calamity like floods will occur repeatedly in Bangladesh, we need to integrate the related disaster management education at all levels of our education to make our youth aware of the scenario and of the measures to take. 

The UN has warned that natural calamities will increase by 40% within 2030 and Bangladesh remains one of the most vulnerable countries to receive the negative impacts of those calamities. The Chief Advisor of interim government in Bangladesh, Dr. Yunus is a Nobel laureate and a global icon. He needs to initiate effort to receive compensation from high carbon emitting countries as per the UN guidelines as Bangladesh is at the receiving end of the negative impacts of climate change due to their carbon emission. 

Our attention has been on flood control for a while now. Nonetheless we must prioritize water management in order to take advantage of the potential while reducing the risks. If we cannot ensure flood water management, we will not be able to ensure sustainable development and people will keep going below the poverty line. Our present administration has a good pool of specialists to develop a practical strategy for flood water management. We hope that Bangladesh would devise measures that are robust to eliminate the risks of future floods and to grab any opportunities provided.

The writer is Chief Editor at Mohammadi News Agency (MNA) and Editor at Kishore Bangla



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