You can put the blame on the after effects of dreadful Tsunami of December 2004 or the mean sea-level rise on account of climate change, but there is no immediate permanent solution to the rapid erosion of Orissa coast.
The ingress of sea waters along the tourist highway connecting Puri and Konarak and the entire Belabhumi area including Paradeep port, Chilika lake, Gopalpur and Rajnagar has invited fresh worries for the Orissa government.
Chief minister Navin Pattnaik called an emergency meeting of the cabinet after reviewing the situation with senior officials and was quick to announce a Rs 7 crore package to protect the Puri-Konarak tourist highway from further erosion. The action proposed is filling the area with sand bags and largescale plantation of trees.
But this would be a temporary measure to save the situation. ?We have constituted an expert group headed by the chief engineer of water resources to find out the causes for erosion of the coast and have been asked to submit its report by early next month. Experts from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Chennai have also been asked to study the situation and suggest remedies,? said the state?s revenue minister, Manmohan Samal.
The state government has also planned to check other areas of the coast at an estimated additional investment of Rs 15 crore. However sand filling along the coast would be only a temporary measure. it is also not much dependable.
Though the reports from expert panels are due, the state has received some initial feedback, which suggests that the current situation may be due the disturbances caused in the sea bed due to the dreadful Tsunami of December 2004.
Added to this is the problem of rise in the mean sea level, particularly in the Bay of Bengal. Rise in the mean sea level is global phenomena caused due to fast melting of glaciers and snow caps on account of global warming. The state government has referred all these issue to the expert panels for their indepth review.
There may be another cause for the situation. Orissa usually receives good showers and also intermittent rains around the year. Often the state experiences floods due to rise in reservoir levels, but the erosion of coast is now a new phenomena.
Experts believe the cause of the current problem may not be due to good monsoon downpour but due to after effects of December 2004 Tsunami and the rise in the mean sea-level.