Come floods, heroes surface to fish people out of misery in Chennai
CHENNAI: When Sangavi Vijayaraghavan received a distress call on December 4, she was a little baffled. A flooded area in Mudichur in Chennai, marooned for a long time, had run out of drinking water, leaving several residents in sheer panic.
From the lap of safety at her residence in Selaiyur, Tambaram East, the 26-year-old mother of one had no time to waste. “At that time, a single thought crossed my mind. Now that I am safe, I should help those in need.” Sangavi and her husband Pradhap Lakshmanan, employed in the corporate world, immediately slipped into their other garb as members of Direction for Volunteers.
relief material to flood-affected
people | Express
There was not much stagnation of water on the main roads, but the situation was grim as one moved deeper into the locality. Since the NDRF refused to go to these places due to deepwater levels and the dearth of volunteers on the ground, they relied on the fishermen and their boats. “Among those to be rescued were a woman and a child with a high fever. We received the request around 4 pm, and by the time, we found a boat and rescued them, it was 7 pm,” said Sangavi.
Soon after, they started getting multiple requests for essential items and rescue as the situation worsened. Due to the absence of mobile network in many areas, the couple wrote down rescue requests and went to Pallikaranai the next day. “The ground reality was in contrast to what we expected. People ranging from elderly women to pregnant women needed to be rescued,” said Sangavi.
Even till Tuesday, the couple was engaged in providing food and relief in Mudichur and Pallikaranai. They were later intimated about an inaccessible area by distressed parents of Pradhap’s colleague in Sai Nagar, Thoraipakkam.
Sangavi recalls wading through stagnant water mixed with sewage and carcasses of animals. Sangavi alerted an influencer, asking them to highlight the situation on their YouTube channel. “We had bought basic items, including bread, sanitary pads, biscuits, mosquito repellents, candles and water bottles. I was very scared to walk in that water, and multiple rashes broke out the next day. Girls from an orphanage in the area also reported infections,” Sangavi adds.
Following this, officials from the Greater Chennai Corporation contacted Sangavi and obtained the details of the locality. Water was later pumped out. Veppampattu in Pallikaranai also missed the officials’ radar, until the couple alerted the GCC to drain water from that locality as well.
Information about areas that the couple visited or got to know about was shared with the corporation officials. That, however, was 1% of the damage. Sangavi said non-operational toll-free numbers, a dearth of volunteers and a lack of proper public announcements when help was reaching a locality made matters worse.
“Many affected people didn’t know when food or boats arrived in their locality. We also noticed the absence of deployment of marine engineers, who had effectively reached areas with high water levels during the 2015 floods. Officials and politicians also posed some hindrance on the ground,” she adds.
Sangavi and Pradhap could have spent leisurely time with their three-year-old but chose to be with the victims of the calamity. “We would leave our three-year-old with the neighbours since we wanted to do whatever we could to help those in distress,” says Sangavi.
Sangavi has been part of the volunteers’ circuit since 2015, when Chennai was afflicted with its last bout of inundation, and has also participated in volunteering in the aftermath of Cyclone Gaja. Her contact information, available online, was sourced by a boy from Mudichur after the rains had rendered government helplines helpless.
Pradhap recalls that even before marriage, Sangavi had asserted that she would continue with volunteering. Four years later, Sangavi ventured into neck-deep Mudichur together with her husband.The couple also urged the youngsters to step up and take social responsibility and address issues in their locality. “There is a volunteer network under the flood management system which I am a part of. However, it is not active. The state could use volunteers like us during times of disasters with a better functioning network,” suggests Sangavi, before signing off.
(Edited by Shrija Ganguly)