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Gallery|Environment

The hungry tide: Bay of Bengal’s sinking islands

As melting snow rushes down from the Himalayas, islands in India’s Bay of Bengal slowly sink amid rising waters.

The Hungry Tide/ DO NOT USE/ RESTRICTED
A rise in sea levels has washed away more than 50 percent of Ghoramara Island since the 1980s, prompting two-thirds of its population to leave and take refuge on the adjacent Sagar Island. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
By Swastik Pal
Published On 7 Aug 20157 Aug 2015
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Ghoramara, India – Ghoramara island is known as the “sinking island”. Located 150km south of Kolkata in the Bay of Bengal’s Sunderban delta, the island, once spanning more than 20sq km, has been reduced to an area of merely 5sq km.

“Over the last two decades I’ve lost 1.2 hectares of cultivable land to the Muriganga river and had to shift my home four times. There has been no resettlement initiative from the government,” said Anwara Bibi, 30, a resident of Nimtala village on the island.

Global warming has caused the river to grow. Flowing down from the mighty Himalayas the river brings more and more snowmelt along as it empties into the Bay of Bengal.

High tides and floods play havoc on the fragile embankments, displacing hundreds of islanders every year.

“Most men have migrated to work in construction sites in the southern part of India,” Sanjeev Sagar, the head of the local council of Ghoramara Island, told Al Jazeera.

More than 600 families have been displaced in the last three decades, leaving behind 5,000 odd residents struggling with harsh monsoons every year.

“A large-scale mangrove plantation could prevent tidal erosion,” suggested Sugata Hazra who is a professor at the School of Oceanographic Studies at Jadavpur University. “With every high tide a part of the island is getting washed away.” 

Only those without any means to migrate are left on this island.

Amid this crisis, basic services such as education are being neglected by authorities.

“The nearest senior secondary school is across the river at Kakdwip,” said Sourav Dolui, 16, a 9th grade student at the Ghoramara Milan Bidyapeeth. 

The Hungry Tide/ DO NOT USE/ RESTRICTED
The Sundarbans are one of the largest group of river delta islands in the world. The sensitive ecosystem of the islands has been drastically altered due to severe erosion on the eastern part of the island. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Only a handful of families dare to stay along the sinking coastline. The sinking of Ghoramara Island is attributed to a confluence of disasters - man-made and natural. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Located at the mouth of Bay of Bengal, the Muriganga River which is a distributary of the Ganges, connects the island to the nearest harbour, Kakdwip. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
The Hungry Tide/ DO NOT USE/ RESTRICTED
Suraj Jamal Mallick, 12, sits in front of his broken house. Every year, as the island shrinks, more people on the island become homeless as environmental refugees. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Lack of arable land has forced many islanders to take up fishing for a living. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Smt Urmila Kar, 53, cooks a meal for her family. There is an acute shortage of food supplies, which mainly arrive from the harbour across the river. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Lohachara, another island near Ghoramara, was once inhabited but now lies deep down in the river bed. Ships sail over where it once stood. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Salt water inundation has increased salinity of the soil to an alarming limit, making agricultural harvesting extremely difficult. Betel vine cultivation is one of the major sources of income on the island. However, rising water levels have washed away acres of plantation land, leaving behind financial difficulties. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
The Hungry Tide/ DO NOT USE/ RESTRICTED
As a part of the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS), special classes are conducted for kindergarten and lower primary students. Most of the students come from extremely poor families because a mid-day meal is provided. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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The government seems to be unconcerned about the last inhabitants of the island. The future of the island seems to have been abandoned and neglected by the authorities. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Fishermen travel across to the Kakdwip harbour to sell their catch. This wooden trawler is the only mode of transportation connecting this remote island to the harbour. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]
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Chaya Mondal, 76, waits near the coastline, where the fishing trawlers would return at the end of day's catch. She has spent all her life on this vanishing Island. [Swastik Pal/Al Jazeera]


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