The village that went under water

Pirambadative is village in Vallachanai. Its not searchable in google. Its isolated, unless these floods we won't know it. The only acces to the village is by a boat. On 10th January they all had suffer and went sleep. It was raining heavily but they were not bothered as they had not been hit by rain for decades known to them. Around 3.00 AM the water starts flowing into the village.



The rain has increased the water level and this small island was inundating. They asked for help and army came and requed them using boats. Some children only got to the boat when the water was knee high. Some adults were the last to be rescued, when the water was waist high. They had no time to be concerned on their belongings. Then they came to kinniadi school camp.



We could see their village about a kilometer away. Houses half covered. They said at highest flood, they could not see the roofs of many houses. When we asked how the condition in the village is, “we don’t know yet” they said. Imagining the damage done is not easy as we can imagine a village under waster. The fish is swimming around a kichten is what we can imagine.



They came to the camp in one dress they were wearing. Now for 4 days they were wearing the same. They were day workers and fisher community living from the lagoon. If Army could not save them, we would have a heard a tsunami story. “Thanni wandititu ellam poittu”, water came and every thing was gone. They were a self sustained community with Cattle, Goat, Poultry Breeding and fishing. Its even not possible to asses the damage to their life.




In one night a village become a displaced and their economy damage beyond easy recovery. The whole village is poor now with no meaning of economic recovery. The challenges they are facing now is to find food and clothing and a place to stay. The school can’t shelter them when water recedes. The next challenge is to rebuild their life.



Imagine a fisherman whose nets are gone. Imagine a mother whose 25 poltry who gave 15 eggs are gone. Imagine a child whose uniforms, books, pens and pencil and school bag is gone. Imagine a family returning to a broken or collapse house which had been in water for many days. Their priorities are when returned re-building their house. If they build it same way, they would be caught in next floods. How we improve their condition by designing new model of homes that would stand floods. One best example comes from Ratnapura, where people are flooding ready. We have to build their homes in a new design which I see as an opportunity to address climatic change related disasters.

Their next challenge is to find clean water. Whole network of wells to be cleaned, This require large number of pumps, which is not available in the area. We need volunteer groups bring water pumps help them.



The children need cloths and books to to school again. Unless we help, they will drop school and create a large unemployed group which will hinder national development. The text books can come from the government. Pens, pencils, schoolbags and exercise books can come from the students. School uniforms and casual dresses for children is a prime need.



The activities we can do is large list, which should be shared among us. The impact of floods is silent; it comes slow and recedes slow, damaging lives destroying domestic economy creating long term looses to a nation. Hence this disaster came from rain, would come again, we need to develop new disaster recovery linking it to national development. Hence this is an opportunity to approach with a community driven post flood re-building effort in a new way.