Welcome flood

Wise before the event is the real wisdom. Wise after the event still leaves some hope of sanity. But our version of wisdom – like our politics and history – is unique and matchless. Before the tragedy we aren’t that suicidal as we are after. Whatever the game, we win by losing. Flood is just another example.  

What happened in 2014 instead of warning us for future, emboldened us to repeat the same story and repeat it with a never before audacity. We decided to defeat floods in a different way. We did what we had left undone. The constructions unseen and unheard of sprung up in the heart of the riverbeds thereby ending all possibilities of water flowing from below. We have gone the whole hog. We filled up the unfilled spaces, stuffed every empty channel, blocked every available hole. We punched flood in the face. A befitting answer. It was unbelievably different from what flood-hit people do after the disaster. Our message was simple. `You flood, next time when you hit us, think twice. You can’t breach a dam now as the dam is not there. You can fly, not float. Earlier you hit us from the bottom, now you can crash us from the top. All routes in this line are busy now. Busy everywhere. Somewhere we have hotels, somewhere mosques, somewhere shopping complexes and somewhere residential houses. You have no way to sneak through. It’s like a border that we have sealed from all sides. If you are caught crossing the line, we can shoot you dead’. Now if flood has some trace of dignity left, it will never knock at our door as we have slammed all doors shut. 

   

Unfortunately the flood doesn’t read editorials, articles, news reports, letters to editor. It doesn’t read warning signals of Met. Department. It doesn’t care about the advisories issued by weather experts. Otherwise our newspapers – all these years – cried out loud about an imminent danger that is just a matter of time. Our government was busy foreseeing the future of the alliance, leaving the present to the mercy of an invisible care-taker. They just issued statements like sandbags to dam the invading waters. 

We have progressed, but our mode of progress is reverse. Earlier it was a five-day relentless rain spell that crashed our dams and channels. Then a three-day shower brought us to the edge, and now we have bridged the time gap at an amazing pace. Now it is just a daylong downpour that fills our gutters, drains and lanes. If we progress at the same pace (and pray we do), next time a single sneeze from the smallest rain god will be big enough to swallow us all. 

Earlier there was a crack, now the crack is a seven-story monster. If flood breaches us now, it will be a breach of trust. 

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