The intersecting impacts of COVID-19 and climate change are compounding the vulnerabilities of coastal communities. This paper examines the disastrous effects of cyclone Amphan in the Bengal delta region of the Indian Sundarbans amidst a countrywide lockdown triggered by the pandemic, and their cascading consequences for a rural community inhabiting this climate hotspot. It highlights the livelihood crisis experienced by internal rural-urban migrant workers who returned to their villages in the Sundarbans from other Indian states under challenging conditions. Triangulating data from interviews with return migrants, literature, and policy documents, the paper argues for a move beyond the traditional short-term, relief-based responses. It proposes integrating a rural community’s long-term economic recovery and self-reliance as a pillar of policy dialogues on climate change and mobility at national and regional scales.
January 16, 2021 – 7:12 am
Well, it was either blaming attacks (which have always happened. Indians have known of this long enough to wear mask on the backs of their heads, so tigers think someone is looking at them) on ‘climate change’, the patriarchy, or white supremacy, which seem to be the usual wells news outlets like Reuters go to
On a warm November afternoon, Parul Haldar balanced precariously on the bow of a small wooden dinghy, pulling in a long net flecked with fish from the swirling brown river.
Just behind her loomed the dense forest of the Sundarbans, where some 10,000 square km of tidal mangroves straddle India’s northeastern coastline and western Bangladesh and open into the Bay of Bengal.
Tigers Stalk, Storms Rage, but Poverty Forces Indians Deeper Into the Sundarbans 15/01/2021
Men on a boat row past mangrove trees encircling Satjelia island in the Sundarbans, December 15, 2019. Photo: Reuters/Anushree Fadnavis.
Satjelia, West Bengal: On a warm November afternoon, Parul Haldar balanced precariously on the bow of a small wooden dinghy, pulling in a long net flecked with fish from the swirling brown river.
Just behind her loomed the dense forest of the Sundarbans, where some 10,000 square km of tidal mangroves straddle India’s northeastern coastline and western Bangladesh and open into the Bay of Bengal.
Four years ago, her husband disappeared on a fishing trip deep inside the forest. Two fishermen with him saw his body being dragged into the undergrowth – one of a rising number of humans killed by tigers as they venture into the wild.
7:34 AM MYT
Parul Haldar (R), 39, whose husband died in a tiger attack during a fishing trip, her brother Nitai Mandal, 32, and her mother Lakshmi Mandal, 65, row a boat close to the Sundarban Tiger Reserve (STR) forest near the Satjelia island in the Sundarbans, India, November 20, 2020. According to the Sundarban Tiger Reserve s director, Tapas Das, five people have been killed by tigers in India s Sundarbans since April. REUTERS/Anushree Fadnavis
SATJELIA, India (Reuters) - On a warm November afternoon, Parul Haldar balanced precariously on the bow of a small wooden dinghy, pulling in a long net flecked with fish from the swirling brown river.
Indian Fishermen catch fish on a foggy morning on the Matla river in the Sundarban.
Photo: AFP
Just behind her loomed the dense forest of the Sundarbans, where some 10,000 square km of tidal mangroves straddle India s northeastern coastline and western Bangladesh and open into the Bay of Bengal.
Four years ago, her husband disappeared on a fishing trip deep inside the forest. Two fishermen with him saw his body being dragged into the undergrowth - one of a rising number of humans killed by tigers as they venture into the wild.
That Haldar, a single mother of four, is taking such risks is testament to growing economic and ecological pressures on more than 14 million people living on the Indian and Bangladeshi sides of the low-lying Sundarbans.