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Decomposed corpses pose health hazard

A near epidemic situation prevails in the areas worst-affected by the recent cyclone in Orissa as hundreds of decomposed human and animal bodies still lie scattered over rivers, ponds and paddy fields. The state administration and voluntary organisations have yet to reach most of the less accessible areas.

Army doctors working in the area said unless that steps were taken to quickly dispose the bodies an epidemic might break out any time.

A UNI team that visited Ambiki, Chaulipara, Samanta Sahi, Nagari, Jharpara Kholapa, Dahibora, Bartalaambik, Japa, Gangadevi Para and other villages on both sides of the Hansua river saw hundreds of decomposed bodies scattered over the paddy fields, in rivers and ponds, contaminating the water and polluting the air.

The team, the first press party to reach the areas which were only 3.5 km away from the coast, made the 10 km journey in an army power boat.

Babuli Pradhan of Ambiki village said that "because of non-disposal of carcasses and in absence of nature's scavengers, the bodies and carcasses have started dissolving in the water, contaminating it and posing a serious health hazard to the survivors."

Unless preventive measures were taken on a war footing, various diseases would spread in the next few days, he said.

Though government authorities claimed that the state administration and voluntary organisations were working round-the-clock to dispose of the bodies, no government official or member of any voluntary organisation had so far reached these villages, said Dhruba Mohapatra who belongs to the area.

Mohapatra, a social worker and a journalist of an Oriya daily, said the army first reached the area with food on November 2 and has done a great deal to provide food since then, But no one else had reached the area to dispose of the carcasses.

Former Ersama block advisory committee chairman Arjun Rout said that when the water level rose, the villagers pushed hundreds of carcasses into the river, so that it could flow into the sea.

Although there are hundreds of bodies still lying around, most of the locals, devastated by the tragedy, have neither the will nor the strength to dispose them.

Guru Mallik of Jiraelo village near Erasama put it this way: "We know that the littered bodies will cause disease and even epidemics but we cannot help it. First we have to collect the relief given by various organisations to contain our hunger. The environment and health comes later."

Animal carcasses were also seen lying on both sides of the 16 km-long road from Manijanga near Tirtol to Saraba near Erasama.

The UNI team saw members of voluntary organisations burying bodies only along the Cuttack-Paradip road and on the sides of the Taladanda canal, the biggest canal system in the state.

Pramod Senapati of People For Animals, a non-government organisation, said his group had buried around 500 carcasses in the last five days and that it would clear the roads up to Paradip.

Additional Relief Commissioner S K Jha, who was in charge of five most-affected blocks of Kujanga, Erasama, Balikuda, Astaranga, and Kakatpur, said as many as 20 voluntary organisations were doing a good job of disposing of bodies in these blocks.

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