Back-to-back floods: How a relentless monsoon is testing Odisha
Many households in northern and coastal Odisha had only just cleared the layers of mud and debris left behind by the first flood when the second deluge arrived.
Odisha is grappling with a series of back-to-back floods as a relentless monsoon continues to batter the state. The region had already begun to recover from the initial flood when a second deluge struck, forcing over 2 lakh people to evacuate their homes. Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi has announced a ₹1,110-crore relief package to aid the affected communities.
Meteorologists attribute the severity of the situation to low-pressure systems lingering over the Bay of Bengal and moving at a slow pace. This has resulted in prolonged heavy rain and intensified flooding across various districts, particularly in Balasore, Bhadrak, Jajpur, Mayurbhanj, Keonjhar and Kendrapara. The monsoon trough, which usually extends from Ganganagar to the Bay of Bengal, has remained unusually close to Odisha, exacerbating the rainfall.
With rivers already saturated and catchments already receiving more than a thousand mm of monsoon rainfall, the state is facing significant challenges in managing the ongoing crisis.
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