Wayanad, India — Braving heavy rain, Ubais VV rushed to the government hospital in Meppadi village.
Around him, ambulances flashing red and blue lights and blaring their sirens also arrived at the hospital, carrying bodies of people buried or washed away by a series of landslides that devastated three villages on Tuesday in Kerala’s Wayanad district in the mountains of the Western Ghats.
The 56-year-old Ubais had prayers on his lips as he searched for his daughter Risana, grandson Hanil, son-in-law Firose and the parents of Firose. But he couldn’t find them in the hospital. Instead, the next day, rescue workers retrieved Firose’s body from the Chaliyar River. Now, Ubais is hoping against hope that the rest of his family survived.
“I haven’t spent enough time with my beloved grandson. Hope Allah the Almighty will bring him back,” he told Al Jazeera on Thursday at the mosque in the village of Meppadi.
The confirmed death toll from the multiple landslides stood at 289 as of Thursday, but those steering the search operations and people’s representatives in local self-government bodies believe the actual count could be higher.
At the nearby church-run St Joseph’s School, which has been converted into a shelter for more than 300 people who had left their villages when the rain intensified before the landslides, Reverend Sunny Abraham consoled 62-year-old Nabeesa P.
Eleven members of Nabeesa’s family are missing. “We are here to support you, mother. You will get to know about the whereabouts of all your relatives soon,” he said, holding her hands tightly.
And at the Hindu crematorium a few metres away, relatives of 72-year-old Neelu Amma were crying and holding one another as her body was taken to the pyre on Thursday.
Buried under boulders
Within a few hours, the multiple landslides brought mud, boulders and trees from the top of the hills down to the valley, washing away people, houses and vehicles in Chooralmala, Attamala and Mundakkai villages in southern Wayanad – home to more than 4,500 people. The river that once quietly passed through the village swelled quickly, changing its course and taking everything along with it. Many bodies and body parts were recovered from the river 25km (15 miles) away from the landslides.
The villages, known for their fertile soil and natural beauty, are now covered by boulders. Close to 2,500 residents have been shifted to nine relief camps.
“It is very difficult to locate the bodies now because of the boulders. We don’t know how many people have been crushed under,” Sudheer A, a volunteer participating in the searches, told Al Jazeera. The rescue and search operations are led by India’s army and disaster response team with the support of volunteers.
A bridge that connected Chooralmala to the other two villages was destroyed in the landslides, slowing down the pace of rescue operations.
“The bridge was the lifeline of the three villages. Many lives could have been saved had the bridge not been destroyed,” said Sakeer Pokkkatiil, who used to live in Chooralmala. He lost six members of his immediate family.
Meanwhile, volunteers from sociopolitical organisations helped the police ensure traffic-free rides for emergency vehicles. “I have been helping the police to control traffic for the last two days. I consider it as my duty,” said Saneesh Kumar, who travelled 400km (249 miles) from Ernakulam in south Kerala to work as a volunteer.
Relatives of the missing people thronged the makeshift waiting area at the hospital. Among them was K Merin, who lost four members of her family. “I tried to identify my relatives in the morgue in the last two days, but in vain. It was so excruciating. I hope to find them soon,” she said.
Religious institutions and organisations have made arrangements to conduct the last rites of the victims. “Volunteers have dug more than 50 pits for burial here. We are ready to handle any number of bodies,” said Ali Master, secretary of the Meppadi mosque committee.
C Babu – leader of Seva Bharati, an affiliate of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the Hindu organisation that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party draws its ideology from — said his organisation has cremated 36 bodies as of Thursday. “We expect more bodies in the coming days,” he said.
And those who survived have a rough road ahead.
“Most of the residents in the three villages are poor labourers who work in cardamom and tea plantations,” Chooralmala’s representative in the local self-government, Noorudeen CK, said.
“The real challenge now is the rehabilitation of the survivors. It is going to be tough,” he said.
Vulnerable villages
Kerala accounts for 18 percent of the Western Ghats, a mountainous area that stretches 1,600km (1,000 miles) along the western coast of India and runs through five other states – Maharashtra, Gujarat, Goa, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Wayanad is in this region, where landslides start with the onset of the southwest monsoon every year.
A panel headed by ecologist Madhav Gadgil that studied ecological devastation in the Western Ghats in 2011 classified 64 percent of the region as either highest sensitive, high sensitive or moderate sensitive. It recommended a stop to mining, polluting industries and large-scale development activities in the two most sensitive zones, but all six states opposed these recommendations.
After this opposition, the central government formed another committee, headed by scientist K Kasturirangan. This committee watered down many of the Gadgil panel’s recommendations. The panel, however, recommended that 13,108sq km (5,061sq miles) of Kerala be declared sensitive, but under pressure from the state, the committee brought down that area to less than 10,000sq km (3,860sq miles).
Author of the book Flood and Fury: Ecological Devastation in the Western Ghats, Viju B said the Gadgil panel had classified Chooralmala under the highest eco-sensitive zone. “There are two major reasons for this disaster: one, the high intensive rainfall that has been falling in the Western Ghats, especially in Wayanad due to climate change. The second is unscrupulous development in the name of tourism and highway road expansion,” he said.
He said the state government appears to be insensitive to Wayanad’s ecological challenges. “The Kerala government has approved a 2,000-crore-rupee ($240m) mega tunnel project that passes close to the spot where the landslide has occurred,” he said.
“It is high time the government reviewed these mega projects.”
