CTC - TN Floods - Rebuilding lives




Monday, December 14, 2015
Last Saturday we visited 40 remote hamlets along with our Pondy CTC team in the outskirts of Cuddalore. Many villages have been severely impacted repeatedly by cyclone Thane 2 years ago and now again by torrential rains and floods from nearby rivers and water bodies. Damage to the homes and fields is extensive and it'll take significant rebuilding efforts for people to get back to their normal lives. Even though lots of immediate relief (food, blankets, medical...) is reaching Cuddalore and outskirts, eventually a large rehabilitation effort is required to restore the livelihood of these people.

CTC along with a few other NGOs, individuals and companies is planning to adopt a few poor villages which have been particularly severely impacted by flooding from nearby rivers. In one particular village of 350 families around 110 homes had been partly or completely damaged. Relief provided by the government is insufficient to rebuild these homes. Another village along the coast near Pichavaram had been badly impacted by salt water contamination of agriculture fields due to flooding from nearby backwaters impacting their livelihood.


So far more than 500 individuals and groups have donated to the CTC Flood Relief Fund. Part of the funds have been used to procure immediate relief materials towards flood impacted villages near Chennai and Cuddalore. As however large quantities of relief materials poured into the city over the past week we plan plan to direct most funds towards rehabilitation. We still need more support as this rebuilding effort will require significant financial resources - those interested to be part of this rehabilitation effort can donate to our CTC Relief Fund over here. We will provide you with regular updates on the progress.

In addition to rebuilding homes and livelihoods we will also plan to adopt a few families who have been devastated by the recent floods. Meet below Paramu - 2 years old, Bharath 4 and Bhavana 6 from the same village we plan to adopt. Their father got washed about by the floods. His body was found in the fields only 4 days later. Their future is unknown. Mom and grand parents have nothing left - no home, no land, no daily income. They are surviving only on the sporadic food relief which passes the villages by some NGOs.

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