After some initial sunny days the advent of spring isturning gloomy and rainy. And that is absolutely normal. If a sunny day doesn’tmake a summer, some days of rain don’t take the light of spring away.
But what worries us here is unusual. Kashmir is a place thatis now perennially threatened by the danger of floods; this particularly after2014. What adds to the danger of a flood is the fact that it snowed too much thiswinter, and this snow is banked on the mountains that feed our rivers and otherwater bodies. As the temperature rises the snow melts raising the level ofwater in our rivers.
Though a normal geographical phenomenon, but here it soundsan alarm. If some days of rain are added to it, the danger multiplies manytimes over. That is why a slight drift in weather, and some little showerinterspersing sunny days make us worry. This is something that we have now beentaking about almost every day after that horrible thing called 2014 floods.
And this is not something of an unfounded fear. It is realand it can strike any moment. The question that comes to surface, and no onecan ignore it, is that what has been done to ward off such a danger after 2014.
If we say saynothing, we would be off the mark. But if we say the required has been done wewould be far off the mark. An objective assessment of the things on the groundtells us that there is much to be done. It won’t be realistic to expect thatthe government can clear the structures raised in the flood prone areas andrestore the earlier order when we had enough empty land for the flood water tohold.
But what can reasonably be done is to do dredging of thewater bodies at a faster pace, and raise the level of embankments. That is theleast the government can do. Part of it has been done, rest needs be taken upat a war footing.