Incessant monsoon rains and flash floods have submerged several houses in Mon district. Nearly 950 homes across the area have been either partially or fully damaged, displacing numerous families. (Photo Courtesy: Konyak Union)
Mon, July 21 (MExN): The Konyak Union, Mon headquarters has sought urgent economic relief and rehabilitation packages from the Nagaland government for large-scale destruction caused by incessant monsoon rains and flash floods in Mon district. It highlighted that that food security, livelihoods and connectivity across the region have been severely hit.
In the memorandum submitted to the Chief Minister of Nagaland, through the Deputy Commissioner, Mon, the union highlighted that during the Chief Minister’s visit to the district on July 20, a comprehensive damage assessment could not be presented due to a complete breakdown of communication systems across the region.
The union said the relentless downpour and the subsequent swelling of rivers have “wreaked havoc,” causing huge displacement and damage to livelihoods, properties and livestock, with flash floods also hitting the low-lying regions of the district.
Nearly 950 houses across the district have been either partially or fully damaged, leaving several families displaced, the union said, adding that partial drone footage of the destruction was shown to visiting officials in Mon.
“Due to gravity of this situation, many affected families (are) causing untold desolation that required urgent state-sponsored intervention,” the union said in the memorandum, signed by its president K Yamao Konyak and general secretary Wango Konyak.
The union said traditional jhum (shifting cultivation) fields due for harvest in August had been “completely washed away” in the Wakching area, with topsoil eroded across approximately 135 village fields, either through landslides or flooding, leaving farmers “with no means of sustenance or production.”
Large tea plantations and other commercial crops have also been damaged or submerged in floodwaters in Wakching, Tizit, Naginimora and Upper and Lower Tiru belt, it said.
The union further said the daily commercial supply of tea leaves from Mon district has been stranded, with transportation between Assam and Mon disrupted by flooding and landslides, cutting off plucked tea leaves from reaching processing units and blocking the inward supply of essential commodities to the district.
Roads connecting the sub-divisions of Phomching, Aboi, Tobu, Wakching, Naginimora and Tizit, as well as the road linking Mon district to Assam, remain inaccessible, the union said.
It urged the state government to sanction immediate financial compensation and agriculture input subsidies for farmers who lost jhum fields and submerged plantations, besides compensation for “unaccounted properties and loss of houses/building/lives,” in line with State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) norms.
Calling it “a matter of life and livelihood,” the union said prompt government action would bring much-needed relief to the affected residents of the district.
The union also said an earlier assurance on urgent activation of restoration work on roads and bridges was “still not responded” to, and called for the immediate deployment of government machinery, saying the efforts of civil society groups had “become exhausted.”
“Konyak Union has urged the government of Nagaland to immediately intervene/deploy government machineries in restoration work,” the memorandum said, adding that it looked forward to a “positive response and support” from the state during the humanitarian crisis.
