Six Years Major Historical Urban Floods in West Bengal State in India: Comparative Analysis Using Neuro-Genetic Model

Abstract

An estimated 96 percent of deaths related to natural disasters in the past decade occurred in developing countries. Flooding is one of the greatest water-related environmental disasters and is the major concern in West Bengal state in India. The number of people vulnerable to devastating floods is expected to rise due to large-scale urbanization, population growth in flood-prone areas, land use changes, climate change and rising sea levels apart from its contributions to the biodiversity and sustainability of ecosystems and to many human activities. New disaster risk reduction approaches are needed to build the necessary capacity to address these challenges. Based on this context, an investigation is made in the state of West Bengal in India over six years of extreme rainfall event highlighting the flooding situation interlinked with the structural and non-structural measures and its management strategy. West Bengal State experience heavy precipitation particularly in the months of September and October consequently upon low pressure/depressions developed in the Bay of Bengal during the years 1956, 1959, 1978, 1995, 1999 and 2000, which faced such worst type of rainfall and the year 2000 may be designated as the year of the worst precipitation in terms of quantum, intensity and duration. Lack of control structures coupled with very high discharge in the rivers during the year 2000 resulted in prolonged agony for a large number of people within the state. It is also attempted to develop a neuro-genetic models to identify the relationship between return period and extreme rainfall event.