Ghoramara island has been shrinking: living on the frontline of global heating
Sunil Kandar, Ghoramara Island, India: I live in the Hatkhola locality of Ghoramara. I remember how on this island, during my childhood, I had a very happy and enjoyable life. We had a big mud-walled house. We also had large farmland of our own where rice and other vegetables grew. We sold a big part of our farm produce in the market. Like some other families in the island we were pretty rich. The farmland owned by our family was our biggest strength.
Our island is located
at the mouth of a river coming from the north. The northern edge of the island
began sinking bit by bit under the river water when I was a child. Then, 20 or
25 years ago, the sea began eating away land around the southern edge of the
island where we lived. Ghoramara
began going underwater almost from all sides and the island began
shrinking fast. Farmlands and houses of the people are constantly going
underwater.
Cyclones are pounding
our island more frequently in recent years. The fragile island is too feeble to
keep away the tidal waves. Often during natural disasters, tidal waves cause
flooding of the island with salty seawater. Whatever farmlands are left on the
island are turning unusable because of inundation by seawater and increasing
salinity of the soil…
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