- Side effects of Biperjoy type storms

- Occasional

- Unconscious sea water that remains in the village for three to four days can cause salinity even in the well.

Cyclone Biparjoy will have direct and indirect effects on social life. Direct effects are in front of the public, while indirect effects will be seen after the storm has passed. Due to these types of storms, the people in the villages where the sea water enters become homeless and the belongings may also be washed away.

The most damaging side effect is that seawater can destroy standing crops and seawater Salinity (salt content) can be found in the village soil for about a year or so. The salinity of seawater can cause much greater damage to agriculture than expected. Saline soil makes agricultural land infertile. Soil fertility is depleted due to salinity. Nothing can grow in it afterwards. The government has no immediate solution to this problem. The rain of relief will be seen, but long planning will have to be done to enrich the lands.

Marine cyclones like Biparjoy can cause the most damage to productive agricultural lands. Cyclone eruptions cause hardship to the people living in coastal areas who live their lives based on agriculture. Salinity enters their lands. In villages where sea water stays for three to four days, salinity also enters the water of the wells. The government should provide drinking water facilities for several months in these villages. Apart from village wells, rivers etc. also become saline.

The more turbulent the sea water is, the more it proves disastrous for agriculture. Seawater is fine for coconuts or mangroves, but other crops are fine, not even acacia.

In some coastal villages, a wall of perforated stones is built under the sea at the village padar so that the sea water does not enter and destroy the agricultural lands. However, the miners make the environment miserable. They break down such walls. Those who collect sand and soil by making big pits are respectable, so no laws affect them. They dig a mine near the village sometimes so deep that the sea water seeps in from below and salt water also enters the village well. There are also small traders who dig up the sand-soil and check it.

Sea water can neither be used for irrigation nor for drinking. The process of removing the salinity of seawater is called desalination. If salinity could be easily removed from sea water, there would never be a shortage of water for agriculture or drinking water. The crops and flowers we grow there usually use fresh water. It keeps itself green by the principle of capillary attraction. Their roots cannot absorb saline water.

As noted earlier, where seawater is inundated for a long time, it seeps into the ground, destroying soil fertility. The sodium in salt water does not allow soil particles to settle. So the soil cannot remain fertile.

It is not that salt water is not used at all in India. Research on sea water desalination is underway in Tamil Nadu. There is also a threat of brackish water growing.

Biparjoy-type storms that cause seawater to enter coastal villages have far-reaching consequences. The storm passes, but its destructive shadows stretch far and wide. The broken houses may be rebuilt, but how can the fertility of the soil be brought back? Mankind is truly crippled at all levels against nature.

While it may be exciting to watch on screen the sea water entering the village and the waves in the wake of any such storm, the horror of the real situation is unbearable.