Houses, resorts & livelihood of over 15k people affected

kolkata: Mousuni Islands—a popular offbeat tourist destinations in South 24-Parganas—is one among the worst-affected areas due to the dual effect of the very severe cyclonic storm Yaas and spring tide last Wednesday, when the water level of both the river and the sea rose abnormally breaching embankments and completely flooding the island, squeezed between Sagar Island and Bakkhali and some parts of the Namkhana block.

The district administration has already swung into action chipping in with 15 tankers each of capacity 2000 litres of fresh water from the state Public Health Engineering department. Apart from this, 4500-5000 pouches of fresh water are being provided to affected families every

day. Cooked food is being supplied to about 12,000 people every day.

The 'kaccha' houses have all been damaged. Even the 'pucca' houses were submerged in chest-deep waters till Friday morning with the water-level abnormally increased due to the effect of spring tide. Most of the 60-odd resorts and nature camps at the island had either been devastated or washed away. "Most of the things in my resort have been washed away by the raging sea waves. It is impossible for me to rebuild the resort without support from the administration,"said Babul Haque, a resort owner at Mousuni.

"Agriculture and fishing which are the main source of livelihood of over 15000 odd inhabitants of this island located between Bay of Bengal and Chinai river have been affected as saline water of the sea inundated the ponds and agricultural lands thereby dealing a telling blow to fishing and agriculture," said a senior district official.

The district administration has laid emphasis on health issues at a time when the state is fighting the COVID-19 situation. "Village-level female health workers-ANM and ASHA are moving throughout the areas of the island for identification of any health related issues. Adequate medicines are there at all 4 sub-centres in the island and medicines are also being distributed as per requirement," added the official. About 12 to 15 camps will be set up in different places of the island, where health officials along with adequate medicines will remain present.