Agrarian and Socio-Infrastructural Vulnerability in the Wake of Flood: An Example from the Mayurakshi River Basin, India

Abstract

The present work intends to portray the impact of the flood on the agrarian decline and socio-infrastructural vulnerability in a tropical river basin like the Mayurakshi River Basin (MRB), India. The study has been carried out based on the questionnaire survey of over 2366 households spreading over 43 villages and two municipality wards across the five community development (C.D.) blocks coupled with some secondary data (annual flood reports, district census reports, topographical maps, and satellite images). The flood magnitude has been portrayed in terms of flood frequency, depth, duration, and inundation over MRB while the agricultural and socio-infrastructural vulnerability is measured using cropping intensity, crop diversification index, and relative importance index. The results portray that during the last 20 years (1998–2017), the average flood frequency ranged from 9 to 12 times and flood depth on agricultural land varied from 1.89 to 3.72 m and average flood duration ranged from 15 to 40 days. The severity of floods wrecks havoc on the agrarian economy reducing the cropping intensity and crop diversity of the study regions especially those located in low-lying areas like Kandi. Thus, flood triggers seasonal unemployment in these areas acting as the catalyst for labor migration mainly in the Middle East countries. Besides, infrastructural vulnerabilities like the collapse of the kutcha houses, and rural muddy roads are notable. More than 90% of people were affected with diarrhea during floods due to the intake of contaminated flood water. Furthermore, skin diseases are also common in the flood and post-flood periods of the study area. Regarding psychological health, the C.D. block Kandi demonstrates that the higher flood-prone block has the lowest phobia as flood is very common in the region but maximum shock due to the huge agricultural loss.