Washington, DC (BWA) -- Baptist World Aid (BWAid), the relief and development arm of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA), has sent grants totaling US$12,000 for cyclone emergency relief to Bangladesh and India.
Cyclone Aila affected southern Bangladesh and eastern India on Monday, May 25, and has claimed almost 200 lives, a death toll that is expected to rise as rescuers reach remote villages cut off by flood waters.
"Our team visited the area and found the present need is drinking water and dry food," said Leor Sarkar, general secretary of the Bangladesh Baptist Fellowship. "All the water wells are under water or are mixed with saline water and there is no source of sweet water as the salt water covered the whole area," Sarkar reported. "We're now distributing drinking water and food to save their lives." A number of persons, he said, are living on boats.
Sarkar, who is a member of the BWA Commission on Church Leadership and the Promotion and Development Committee, informed the BWA that 27 Baptist churches "in Khulna, Bagherhat, Satkhira, Noakhali and Laxmipur districts have been affected by this disaster."
Bangladesh Baptist Church Sangha, through its Social Health and Education Development (SHED) Board, reported that "wind-driven tidal surge caused by the cyclone damaged a number of flood control embankments in different districts." Philip Halder, Director of SHED, told the BWA that several thousand houses were washed away by seawater, and more than 15,000 persons in eight villages have been marooned.
The US$7,000 sent by BWAid to SHED will be used to purchase food items for approximately 2,000 families in Bagherhat, Khulna and Potuakhali districts.
Nirmal Sapui, general secretary for the Bengal Baptist Union (BBU) in India, told BWAid Director Paul Montacute that the cyclone severely affected the Sunderban area, the world's largest mangrove forest, along the India-Bangladesh border.
Some 700 villages in India were affected by the cyclone, destroying 6,000 houses and damaging 8,000 more. "Thousands and thousands of animals died," said Sapui, who is a member of the BWA General Council and the Christian Education Workgroup. Both agricultural and aquaculture enterprises will be affected for up to a year, he stated.
The BBU received US$5,000 from BWAid.
The same general area was affected by Cyclone Sidr in 2007, killing approximately 3,500 persons.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
Indian Border Security Force (BSF) soldiers distribute bottles of water to people in the cyclone-hit area of Monipur village in the Sundarbans delta, about 100 km (62 miles) southeast from the ...
