PAIDEUMA JOURNAL ISSN NO : 0090-5674

Flood and the paradox of women: A content analysis

Bijit Das

PhD research Scholar, Dept of Sociology

Dibrugarh University

Abstract

Media acts as a ladder between the common people and regional happenings around us. Media is in a way the arsenal of news regarding politics, sports, literature, finance, and conflicts, entertainment etc. People in contemporary world get to know about the far away happenings from the shadow of media. The paper is more concerned about how media portrays the role of women as a specific gender in case of natural disaster and their catastrophic loss to the mass, including public administration and government officials. Natural disaster is a common causality happening in all over the globe in any form of flood, tsunami, volcanic eruptions, earthquake etc. Both sides of gender are affected by it. But the perspectives of woman are taken into concern more specifically. This paper is more specific about the 2016 flood in the North Indian state of and Dhemaji district in the state of Assam, India. National media and the state media took part extensively in portraying the issues to the whole mass of India. A content analysis of news articles from national newspaper, Times of India and The Hindu is taken to see if the media is looking into the issues of women’s voice to the administration and the government. Possible issues of health, mobility, finance, food, medicines, protective measures, and training in relation to women will be taken as parameters. The scope of this analysis will bring and eye to the mass through media towards the problems faced by women and implementation of any solution by the state.

Key words- Media, Ladder, Content Analysis, Women’s voice

Assam is the land of two mighty rivers – Brahmaputra and Barak. Each year these two rivers and their tributaries cause floods in vast areas of Assam which leads to human misery and devastation of nature. This year, more than 30 districts including lower and upper Assam have been severely affected,

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Several factors including natural and artificial are responsible for the re-occurrence of floods in Assam. First and foremost, Assam lies in the heart of monsoon belt and so gets overburdened with rainfall every rainy season. Due to this, the river along with its tributaries such as Subansiri, Manas, Kopili, Jia-Bhoroli, etc. get flooded and their banks overflow flooding the vast plain of the state. Secondly, the existence of long ranges of mountains on its northern and eastern boundaries compels the water to flow down into the vast plain causing the rivers to swell. Thirdly, every year due to heavy natural as well as artificial land sliding, Assam loses hundreds of kilometres of its land area. This soil erosion makes the river shallow, which later helps in the creation of a heavy flood.

There are also human-induced factors like destruction of wetlands, deforestation, and encroachment on river banks. Most cities and towns suffer due to poor urban planning. Drainage congestion due to man-made embankments is one of the crucial factors responsible for urban floods that can be visible every year in cities like Guwahati, Chennai, and Mumbai.

Bihar is surrounded by Nepal in the north, West Bengal in the east, Uttar Pradesh in the west and Jharkhand towards the south. There are several rivers that run through the state: Ganga, Sone, Punpun, Falgu, Karmanasa, Durgavati, Kosi, Gandak and the , to name a few. Nearly 85% of the state’s land is under cultivation. Bihar also receives heavy rainfall all through June to October.

The state of Bihar has been facing floods since for a long time. It accounts for almost half of India’s average annual flood losses. In the year 1914, Bengal and Bihar faced floods. In the year 1934, Bihar was shaken by an earthquake which was again followed by floods. The state has been facing floods ever since, but the frequency of floods has become high in recent years. There have been floods almost every year from 1979 which have caused extensive damage. Lakhs of people have lost their lives and their homes. The state has faced infrastructural losses worth crores of rupees. In 2008, more than half of Bihar was submerged under water. The state witnessed its worst floods ever with more than 30 lakh people in more than 1500 villages spread across 16 out of 37 districts being affected. The worst affected districts were Araria, Saharsa, Supaul and Madhepura.

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After the floods in 2008, Bihar faced a drought for two years and again in 2011, nearly 100 villages were flooded by the . Much of Bihar’s misery has been caused by the , which is a major tributary of .

The Kosi river system drains about 60,000 km2 of eastern Nepal and southern Tibet before it enters Bihar. The basin includes almost half of the world’s 8,000 m plus peaks. North of the India- Nepal border, it is known as the Sapt Kosi or “Seven Rivers” in reference to its seven tributaries: Indrawati, Sunkosi, Tambakosi, Lihku Khola, Dudhkosi, Arun and Tamur. Its three main tributaries i.e. Sunkosi, Arun and Tamur join the river at Tribeni. Downstream of the Tibreni, the Sapt Kosi flows through a narrow gauge of 11km, before spreading over the Gangetic plains. As a result of the sudden decrease in slope below the mouth of the gorge, an inland delta is formed. It is interesting to note that the river has shifted more than 100 km westward in the past 200 years.

Geographical conditions

Dhemaji is a small district located in the north east state of Assam. The district comprises of the following boundaries –Arunachal Pradesh to the north and east, Lakhimpur district in the west and river Brahmaputra in the south. An area of 3237 square kilometer is covered by the district. There are a total number of 1150 villages in the district. . There is an average rainfall of 3000m annually. The river Brahmaputra flows from east to west in the southern part of the district c carrying the following tributaries Dihingia, Diadhal, Doridhal, Tangani, Guttong. These make the district vulnerable to flood. The population of Dhemaji mainly relies on agriculture and sericulture, rearing of silkworm1. Bihar is a north central state located in the country sharing boundaries with neighboring states of Utter Pradesh in the west, West Bengal in the east and Jharkhand in the south respectively. The river Ganga flows along the state from east to west making the areas prone to flood resulting in loss every year including death and destruction of crops and properties. The main occupation of the inhabitants of the state is agriculture. Therefore the fortune of the farmers is always craved by the river Ganga.

Women, media and natural disaster

Natural disaster is an episode of calamities by nature. The event of flood in India is an ongoing phenomenon happening every year. Disaster harms both man and woman equally but the inequality in facing the disaster for women then man makes them more susceptible to it. Inequality

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in access of protective measures, resources, medicines, opportunities makes more damage to the women then man. Today’s gender stereotype, education, patterns in way of life is reflected in the women victims of flood. In the myth of flood women are defenseless to sexual abuse and domestic violence. They end up in relief camps where there is no proper security, solitude, privacy and authority for safeguarding the souls. They become prey of illicit activities and often displaced female victims feels uncomfortable attaining supplying from male in the relief camps. (Chew & Ramdas, 2005). Most of the women during their early stage they were not taught few activities equally with men like swimming, tendency to climb trees, high altitudes and so this affects their role in saving themselves from flood. Again women are not natural for any type of stratagem making activities. They are dominated by man in following man’s advice for evacuating the danger zone in any type of disaster. The problems can also be seen in the type of dress woman wears. They are basically into sarees which restricts mobility during disasters. Government at most of time fails to reach the victims in time which results in death of the victims. The patriarchal society that woman lives in makes them more socially and economically vulnerable than man (Infocus program on crisis response and reconstruction, 2000). Women are portrayed as homemakers with free time on hand (Bourdieu, 1986) which isolates them from learning activities, helping them from disasters to safe their life. The women in the relief camp who have lost their dear ones, parents in the disasters falls in the racket of human trafficking and laboring activities. Again the challenging conditions of the victimized women restrains their mental ability, they are challenged socially, economically, health wise. In camp they are challenged for security and privacy. They are exploited by the unnatural advent of gathering from the population. In society young women whose parents were dead during the disaster they were asked to marry at an early age and women who were widowed by the disaster were force to do illicit activities for living and many adopted the path of suicide. Again this makes also an economic challenge for them to sustain living as the men are the breadwinner of our society. Women’s economic vulnerability to future disasters is increased by lack of attention to gender equity in disaster interventions (Evarson, 2000). Furthermore, cultural norms define violence against women as a “private issue” that cannot be discussed and one which is beyond the realm of the public sphere (Sarah Fisher, 2010). Media on the other hand plays an important role in bringing out happenings and news to the mass, so media in the event plays a crucial role in bringing out the problems faced by victimized women to the mass and the government. In the 2016 flood of Bihar and Assam many issue such as hygiene

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problems related to pregnant women and distribution of medicines and sanitary napkin came out through media. Media correspondences sweating blood in the dangerous regions to collect information and news were not wasted in vain. The government soon acted to the situations in the form of relief and protection.

Research methodology

A content analysis is done taking the articles from the Hindu and times of India to check a comparative study on both the flood affected areas and see how media have portrayed with respect to women in the newspapers. And is media bringing out the general problems of the women faced in the two areas. A total number of 46 articles have been reviewed to see all the concerns and prospects of women who were victims of flood on both the regions. Six parameters have been developed to plot the number of instances for each of the regions where media highlights the situation of the women. The following six parameters are- health, mobility, finance, food, medicines, protective measures and training in relation to women. The following content analysis will give the answers of the following research questions-

1. Is media portraying the problems of the women victims to the mass? 2. Is media taking stands in any of the two areas for gathering news? 3. Is there any subsequent problem which being repeated in regular disasters? 4. Is the government implementing any new plans to benefit the mass from the disasters?

Analysis and interpretation

In the first parameter of health out of 46 articles only 23 articles writes about health of women and out of these 23 articles 19 articles talks about the health of women in Bihar and 4 articles talks about Dhemaji. The health related issues mentioned in the articles are of water born diseases, distribution of medicines in the relief camps, medication to the pregnant women. Again In the second parameter mobility, out of 46 articles 12 articles discussed about mobility in Bihar and 17 in Dhemaji. The mobility related issues mentioned in both the papers are of landing in safe places away from the flood destroyed regions, involvement of Indian army in both the regions to rescue the victims. The third parameter finance in the newspapers talks about the aid and finance given by the government and the NGOs, INGOs, respectively. Out of the 46 articles 32 talks of the resources in Bihar and 12 in Dhemaji. The government and the NGOs taking part in supplying

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relief materials, finance to safeguard the people who were marooned by the flood. The forth parameter food, out of 46 articles 16 articles talks about food and reliefs in Bihar and 4 in Dhemaji. The fifth parameter medicines talks about how the pregnant women and women who were suffering from water born diseases were treated in the health care centers and the supply of all the necessary medicines provided by the government and the NGOs online shopping websites (Snapdeal) made it easy for the donors to donate several necessity needs in the favor of the flood victims. But this was only in the case of Bihar not in the case of Dhemaji. Out of 46 articles 7 talk about the medicine and necessity medications in Bihar and two in Dhemaji. The sixth parameter protective measure and training in relation to women out of 46 articles 22 talks about effort taken by the army and the government to help the helpless in Bihar similarly 8 articles talks the effort taken in Dhemaji. In Bihar, the government deployed 587 personals of natural disaster response force in the worst hit areas. A water response official said 2,034 villages had been affected by flood. 5 lakh people displaced till Sunday and 2.50 lakh are living in different shelters 2

Tabulation for parameters with respect to articles of Bihar and Dhemaji

Parameters Bihar Dhemaji

Health 19 4

Mobility 12 17

Finance 32 12

Food 16 4

Medicines 7 2

Protective measures and 22 8 training in relation to women

Total 108 47

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The following data shows that the slant for Bihar is always high in comparison to Dhemaji. This means the national media actively took part in bringing us about the issues of women in flood in Bihar and which is very less in compared to Dhemaji. The following analysis gives us about the state of trauma the women are facing in the flood affected areas and how the government and the state officials are affectively taking part in safeguarding the lives. The following content analysis also gives us the answer of the research questions.

1. Is media portraying the problems of the women victims to the mass?

Answer- Yes the media is showing us the trauma and the problems of the women victimized by the media to the mass.

2. Is media taking stands in any of the two areas for gathering news?

Answer- yes media is portraying the issue of women is Bihar more in comparison to the issues related to women in Dhemaji. News speaks about mother giving birth to their babies in rescue both in Bihar. But similar instances of such are not known from Dhemaji

3. Are there any subsequent problems which are being repeated in regular basis?

Answer- yes there are few problems like the rate of disaster in terms of destruction to property, damage to crops, rise in water born diseases which are seen in regular basis year after year. The government should be more technologically advanced and should safeguard the women from the hands of smugglers and illicit activities in the time of disaster.

4. Is the government implementing new plans and aid to safeguards the victims from disasters?

Answer- Yes from the content analysis we can see that the government is implementing new schemes for women. Aid in terms of finance whose houses were washed away was provided by the government. And mothers who gave birth to babies received extra attention from the government and the administration

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Conclusion

By the following content analysis we can see that the female population is more vulnerable to the disaster trauma. They are having challenging prospects in the myth of disasters. These challenges can be broadly structured in terms of health, society, and economics. The above research also shows us that media though have portrayed the women problems in the two leading newspapers but they have failed to carry out their correspondence in Dhemaji for bringing out more issues in the articles. The news articles also let us know about the issues of the pregnant women in Bihar, but similarly it does not throw a shadow towards Dhemaji in this case. This gives us the view of negligence by the media towards the northeastern areas to bring out the problems related to women in natural disasters.

The suffering of the women craved in the relief camps in terms of security privacy, exploitation, rape, and molestation is not portrayed by the media in any means. But these happenings are held over again and again and there are oral talks which are out casted by our society and general public to reveal the sphere of male dominance and patriarchal notion of governance.

The subjugation of the major issues deviated and not being forecasted by the media, giving us a blind truth and people accepting this blind truth makes them reveal equal sufferings for both man and woman in natural disaster. The layman today sees happenings and sufferings equal for both the sex. But the researcher having an analysis based on the news articles shows that how media fails to give priority to women in terms of natural disaster.

This gives a blind fold for the authority and the government to review the incidents as a normal cause in terms of natural disaster because media is failing to bring the issues of sexual exploiters and human traffickers in the relief camps. The patriarchal society too is responsible for these wrongful acts towards the women because they assume right in not bringing out the issues to the public, government and the administration because this will save the women future career, perhaps by not giving a mark on the victims character which does not keeps the victim remain deviated from the sufferings in her future course of time from the society.

The government on the other hand is doing its valuable job towards the victim by deploying Army personals in the areas which protects the souls from the disaster and from the scavenge mankind.

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Notes

1. https://dhemaji.gov.in/portlets/district-profile

2. https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/flood-situation-in-bihar-worsens-2-6-million- hit/story-nCg07iD5v7TK1Yoqkx4abK.html

References

Bourdieu, P. (2008). 15 the Forms of Capital. Readings in economic sociology, 4(280), 280-291.

Chew, L., & Ramdas N, K. (2005). Caught in the storm: The impact of natural disaster on women. In Caught in the storm: The impact of natural disaster on women. < The> Global Fund for Women.

Enarson, E. (2000). Gender and natural disasters. ILO Infocus Programme on crisis response and reconstruction. http://www. awid. org/go. php? list= analysis&prefix= analysis&item= 00226.

Fisher, S. (2010). Violence against women and natural disasters: Findings from post-tsunami Sri Lanka. Violence against women, 16(8), 902-918.

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