Four months after Cyclone Ockhi, survivors and kin of deceased still counting losses, awaiting compensation

Editor’s note: Cyclone Ockhi, the first severe storm in almost 40 years to have travelled about 2,400 kilometres from the Bay of Bengal to as far as the Gujarat coast, cut a path of devastation and left in its wake shattered livelihoods and broken families. This, the third of a three-part series, examines the lack of adequate measures taken to tackle the effects of the cyclone.

Kanyakumari: On 15 January, 45 days after Cyclone Ockhi ravaged south India in late November last year , Ambica’s husband Crispin S’s body was brought ashore to Neerody village in the Kanyakumari district of Tamil Nadu. Within a week, the district collector personally delivered a compensation cheque of Rs 20 lakh to Ambica. Crispin, a daily-wage worker on a fishing boat, used to earn around Rs 200 a day plus a percentage of the profits from each catch.

Although the compensation is a welcome relief, it can’t make up for Ambica’s loss. Neither is the money of any real use to her in her time of need. She wants to use part of the money to repay a loan of Rs 64,000 taken by her husband from the Indian Bank in Thoothoor by mortgaging their relatives’ jewellery. But the bank won’t allow her to close the loan without a death certificate.

The kin of those killed by Ockhi hasn’t received death certificates yet. Ambica produced Crispin’s post-mortem report, but the bank won’t accept it. “I am in a very difficult position. They (the relatives) call me every day; they need the jewellery back next month as their daughter is getting married. I just want to repay this loan and fulfil my husband’s obligations,” she said.

A missing person is declared dead only when there hasn’t been any news of him or her for at least seven years from the time they are reported missing. But, in natural disasters like Ockhi, as was the case with the tsunami in 2004, those who are still missing after the end of search and rescue operations are declared dead to enable their dependents to access their legitimate claims.

Following in the steps of the  Kerala government , Tamil Nadu (TN) announced relief of  Rs 20 lakh each for the kin of 177 missing fisherfolk  who’ve been presumed dead, amounting to a total of Rs 35.5 crore. It was already giving  Rs 20 lakh  to the next of kin of the confirmed dead and those whose bodies were recovered and identified through DNA tests. Another Rs two lakh is expected from the Centre.

The relief money has created a new set of problems for Ambica, who lives with her in-laws. “My mother-in-law wants Rs two lakh even though she runs a local provision store and can support herself. I have two girls (ages 11 and 12) who I have to educate and take care of, but she insists on taking a share of the money,” says Ambica. It is difficult for her, who has only studied up to middle school, to find a proper job. She and can ill afford to share it with her in-laws.

In these fishing communities, where women are widowed often and young, a working son is the only support they have in their old age. This generates a lot of conflict within the family when the sole earning member is lost. While the wife has the natural right to compensation for her husband’s death, sometimes young women return to their parents’ homes with the relief money, leaving their mothers-in-law without support.

Compensation for kin of the dead, but what about those alive?

Most of the deceased were daily wage labourers who worked on fishing boats from villages in Kanyakumari district, other districts of Tamil Nadu, and other states including Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, and Assam. Their families don’t have any social security.

The condition of boat owners is not much better. Deep sea fishing, which is practised in these parts of India, is a costly affair. Each trip, depending on the size of the boat and the distance and duration of the trip, can cost anywhere between Rs four-eight lakh. This includes the cost of equipment like nets, diesel, ice for storing the catch, food for all the workers, and the cost of labour. The boats are at sea for weeks and don’t return until this initial investment is recovered.

During Ockhi, boat-owners not only lost this investment but also their entire catch and their boats, which cost upwards of Rs 60 lakh each. Cecil M, a boat-owner from Thoothoor, was getting constant reminders from the bank to repay his loans until he submitted a letter, along with an FIR of his destroyed boat, informing the bank that there was no way he could repay his loans. While the follow-ups have stopped, he is now not eligible to apply for any more loans. His only hope is some kind of relief for damaged/destroyed boats from the government.

Yesudhasan T from Chinnathurai owned two boats before Ockhi. One of them was lost, along with eight men (two were rescued) during the cyclone. Yesudasan was in the second boat which managed to return to shore on 1 December, despite having taken a lot of battering in the storm.

“It cost me Rs 10 lakh to repair my boat and put it back into the business. It’s now at sea. I also owe Rs 20 lakh to the bank and to other private parties, and the interests have gone over my head now. What little assets I have might be seized any time.” Both his boats, registered with the Tamil Nadu government, didn’t have any insurance.

It’s been four months since the cyclone but there’s no word from the government yet on compensation for those who lost their boats and equipment like nets. “There has been some relief for the families of those who died, but no one is bothered about those of us who survived. We are the living dead,” said Yesudasan.

A social activist from Muttam, Jayasundram T, said that the fisheries department has put together a list of 2,215 people from Kanyakumari who’ve lost their boats and/or equipment after screening their applications. The relief amount in all these cases will be transferred to the accounts of the affected in the next two weeks, officials at the collectorate office announced on the latest grievance day.

“If they give us the means to get a new boat, we will find a way to survive. After the Tamil Nadu budget is passed, we expect some relief. Otherwise, it will be very difficult because it’ll take us another six months to build new boats and restart our business. I don’t even know if I’ll be alive until then; my mental health has really been affected by all this,” Yesudhasan said.

Although it’s the middle of the March-April fishing season, very few boats are out fishing. The fisherfolk are too scared and traumatised to return to the sea. Many of them are waiting for the government jobs they have been promised. Ambica is one the over 200 people from Neerody village to have applied for these jobs; all of them are waiting to hear back from the government.

Read Part 1: Months after Cyclone Ockhi, Tamil Nadu fisherfolks’ families allege government apathy in recovering bodies

Read Part 2: During Cyclone Ockhi, lack of early warnings and at-sea communication devices left fisherfolk helpless

The author is a Chennai-based freelance writer and a member of  101Reporters.com _, a pan-India network of grassroots reporters. She tweets @Luvnbeer_