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Wednesday, Mar 11, 2009
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The sad tale of a sinking island foretold

Raktima Bose

GHORAMARA ISLAND: The screen came to life with a bearded middle-aged man named Lalmohan Sheikh aboard a boat pointing to the horizon and saying: “There used to a church over there during my childhood but the hungry river gobbled it up.”

This was the opening scene of a documentary film produced by a non-governmental organisation that was premiered here in 24 Parganas district recently.

Launched in the presence of Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi, the documentary, “Mean Sea Level”, depicts the threat of erosion the island faces in the wake of rising water levels and the perilous effects of the phenomenon on the the island-dwellers.

The island, located in the Sundarban delta near the mouth of the Hooghly, has lost half its landmass over the past 25 years to the river, leaving about 7,000 people displaced. It is gradually facing the same fate as the neighbouring Lohachara island that got eroded completely as the water level rose.

Mr. Gandhi said: “Ghoramara Island is part of a global problem called global warming… it is sinking but I would like to say that the situation is yet not critical and the island-dwellers should not panic. They should trust and cooperate with the panchayat, the State government and the Centre to work out solutions and save many such islands.”

On the film being premiered at such a non-descript island rather than at an international platform, he said its purpose was to alert people about climate change and its consequences. There could not have been a more appropriate venue for the premiere.

“Each time the river erodes the bank along with our houses and agricultural fields, we are forced to shift to the inner part of the island, which involves huge cost. We need to borrow money for that and are under the perpetual burden of debt,” Kabita Shit, an island-dweller, said.

Sunita Narain, director of the non-governmental organisation Centre for Science and Environment, said the water level in the Sundarban delta region was rising at a higher rate than the global average and wanted steps to be taken by both the State and the Centre to save the affected .

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