Bodies set adrift due to lack of dry burial grounds

In 2024, the people of Feni witnessed the worst flood in living memory. The sudden onslaught of this flood was unimaginable for the residents of Feni. The destructive nature of the flood extended beyond Feni, affecting the surrounding districts as well. Torrential rains and water surging down from the mountains caused the floodwaters to rise, submerging the roofs of houses in the Parshuram, Phulgazi, and Chhagalnaiya upazilas of Feni. With electricity and all forms of communication cut off, these areas were isolated from the rest of the country. In remote regions where rescue teams could not reach due to the fierce currents, people clung to tree branches, tin roofs, house tops, and rafts made of banana trees in desperate attempts to survive. The elderly, children, women, the sick, and pregnant women faced unimaginable suffering.

My ancestral home is in the GM Hat area of Feni. Our area is relatively more developed. A school was established in GM Hat in 1926, and there is now a college as well. Due to the power outage caused by the flood, the internet, mobile networks, and telecommunication systems were completely paralyzed. People had no dry food, drinking water, fire, stoves, or candles in their homes. As night fell, darkness akin to a grave descended upon the area. The schools, colleges, and madrasas in the area served as the only shelters, not just because roads and houses were submerged, but in many cases, it was impossible to rescue flood victims and bring them to shelter due to the strong currents. With Feni town submerged, traveling from Dhaka or Chittagong to check on relatives in the village was perilous. Expatriates were even more worried than us, constantly seeking updates on their flood-affected relatives. Our forefathers determined the birthdates of our elder siblings by referencing a natural disaster in their time; the August flood of 2024 will similarly serve as a milestone that the new generation will remember for the rest of their lives.

During this disaster, the spirit of solidarity among people set a remarkable precedent. Despite the torrential rain and fierce currents, students and the general public plunged into the rescue efforts of those in danger. The army, navy, BGB, police, coast guard, and fire service conducted rescue and relief operations in the affected districts. While previous disasters had seen unified efforts, the extensive participation of students in this flood was unprecedented. People contributed in any way they could—providing money, food, clothing, medical care, and shelter. Through Facebook, various individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions called for help for the flood victims, and almost every citizen responded. After the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement opened a relief center at Dhaka University’s TSC, crowds of people flocked there, bringing relief supplies. In 1988, students at TSC had similarly made bread and oral rehydration solution (ORS) day and night to save millions of flood victims.

The extent of help people extended to the flood victims was beyond measure. Employees of various government and non-government institutions donated a day’s salary to help the flood victims. Some provided life jackets at nominal prices, others offered trucks, boats, and tractors free of charge for transporting relief materials, and some even supplied fuel for the relief vehicles at no cost. People from all classes, professions, and religions in the country stood by the flood victims. Members of the indigenous community, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, and Christians all contributed money from their religious events’ allocations to aid the flood victims. Some people used their savings for Umrah to help the flood victims. A disabled beggar was even seen donating money from his begging bowl. The most neglected members of society are sex workers, who sustain themselves by selling their bodies. Yet, even the sex workers of Mymensingh handed over their savings of one and a half lakh taka to the flood relief fund.

The army worked tirelessly in the Feni area, rescuing people with their boats and bringing them to safety. However, it was difficult for the small number of soldiers, with their limited resources, to serve the countless people in the area. Anti-Discrimination Movement students sent truckloads of relief materials to the flood-affected areas from Dhaka. Local students and youths, despite fasting themselves, provided relentless service to the flood victims. Volunteer organizations rushed to the flood-affected areas with relief materials. Upon seeing a Vidyananda boat, a child cried out from a window, “We need water and food too.” The species most devastated by the flood were cows, goats, ducks, and chickens; the most oppressed species were dogs, cats, mongooses, jackals, and rats. Where there was no certainty of human survival, it was unlikely that anyone had the delicate sentiment to save cows and goats. Tarashankar brilliantly depicted this sentiment in his story "Tarini Majhi."

In the story, the protagonist swims for a long time with his wife on his back in the midst of the flood but eventually grows too tired and begins to sink. Whenever he tried to let go of his wife's hand to rise to the surface, she held on even tighter in her desperation to survive. In the end, the husband strangles his wife and floats to the surface. The boatman who enjoyed battling the fierce waves of the sea was defeated by the flood, strangling his wife to save himself. However, in this cataclysmic flood, many sacrificed their own lives to save others. A heart-wrenching moment was witnessed when a child, around 6 or 7 years old, dragged a possibly dead infant from the water with both hands and waded through chest-deep water toward the house. With no dry land left for burial, some bodies were set adrift in the water. Even in such catastrophic conditions, the dog-jackal, rat-mongoose species were persecuted by humans.

In a flood-affected area, a rat was climbing onto a house floor with a desperate hope to survive, but the housewife shooed it away with a broom and didn’t let it in. A dog was swimming toward a house just before entering when the housewife shut the door, leaving the dog to perish. Countless dogs were seen swimming in the floodwaters, with no rescue group feeling the urge to save them; indeed, there was no place to keep them even if they were rescued. Despite this, a teenager was seen trying desperately to keep a cow’s head above the water; but he couldn’t because there was no ground beneath his feet. I couldn’t bear to watch the video to the end. In another video, a teenager was seen carrying a calf on his shoulders, trudging through waist-deep water. The calf lay peacefully on the boy’s back, showing no signs of panic. A volunteer was seen pulling a dog out of the water and into a car. I also saw someone in Sonagazi wading through chest-deep water to bring bread for his dog. By now, most people probably think I’m mentally ill, that I’ve lost my mind—why such compassion for “vile” creatures when people themselves couldn’t find shelter? It’s a sign of madness to expect compassion for such creatures during a disastrous flood when they are killed with sticks in normal times.

I have a little more compassion for animals, for which I hear taunts from neighbors every day. While everyone sets traps to kill rats at home, I feed the street dogs and also give food to the rats under my house every night. The floodwaters have receded from homes, roads, and neighborhoods; humanitarian efforts must continue until the flood victims’ lives return to normal. The government may face some challenges in dealing with diseases in the affected areas. After the water recedes, the work of rehabilitating the flood victims is urgent and critical. Flood victims had to use contaminated floodwater to survive, which has led to outbreaks of waterborne diseases such as diarrhea and cholera. In addition to the healthcare services provided by local hospitals and community clinics, nearly eight hundred medical teams have already started working in the affected areas. However, just as hospital bed capacity was increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s now necessary to increase the number of hospital beds and ensure an adequate supply of doctors and medicines. Even with free fertilizers and seeds, it won’t be possible to restart farming because all the cattle used for plowing have drowned in the floodwaters.

Moreover, making homes habitable again is risky. All the snakes that came out of their holes during the flood have taken shelter in the nooks and crannies of houses. Without adequate treatment for snakebite victims, death is inevitable. The electric meters, connections, and switches in every home have been submerged; in this condition, connecting electricity will increase the risk of life, and several people have already died while trying to switch on the power. Not only the history of deaths of flood victims, but this time history has also been made by the fearless students and youths who sacrificed themselves to save others. Thus, a glorious story of survival and saving others has been written in Bangladesh this time. This story also contains heart-wrenching moments of people losing their lives and hopes due to the flood. This history will record the humanity of the flood victims, whose sense of humanity led them to prioritize their neighbors’ need for relief over their own across Feni.

Zeauddin Ahmed: Former Executive Director of Bangladesh Bank and former Managing Director of Mint.