SocialDocumentary.net | Praful Rao | The Silent Disaster

Photographer: Praful Rao

Organization: SaveTheHills

Title: The Silent Disaster

Location: India

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Exhibit Abstract

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Exhibit Abstract

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Exhibit Abstract

Alaichikhop's forgotten children - September, 2007.
Torrential rains in Sept 2007 unleashed a huge landslide in Alaichikhop village in Kalimpong. The landslide (it was actually a gigantic garbage slide, since this was where the town's solid waste was dumped for decades) destroyed many homes, and the affected people were forced to take shelter at a school in a nearby village for several months. NGOs provided food and clothing for the people until they could return to their homes.

The Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalayas has had a long history of treacherous landslides, and as such, finds its place among the most landslide-prone areas of the world. Thus, year after year during the monsoons this hazard causes loss of life and land, destruction of property, and huge economic losses – yet no comprehensive and sustained program has been undertaken in this region to prevent and mitigate a form of natural hazard, which can, to a large extent be managed and controlled.

As such, we are fighting a losing battle against landslides that are now the most serious environmental challenge facing those living in Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalayas.

I am Founder/President of SaveTheHills (http://savethehills.blogspot.com), an NGO working in the Darjeeling district, since 2007, towards raising awareness about landslides and the fragility of our mountains. I am also a photographer (http://prafulrao.com), and I have decided to use the medium of photography to document the human face of landslides and highlight the silent suffering of all those who lose life and property to this scourge without anyone knowing or caring about it.

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I am a 58 year old photographer from Kalimpong (Darjeeling district, India).
In Sept 2007, I was rudely woken up to a nightmare that recurs every year – the scourge of landslides.

Since then "SaveTheHills," an NGO that I founded, has been working consistently towards awareness, advocacy, and capacity-building issues as regards landslides in the Darjeeling hills, and a record of this can be found in our blog (http://savethehills.blogspot.com).

Landslides are the least known of disaster forms primarily because they affect so few, and therefore I have decided to use the medium of photography to record and document the suffering of those who live with this curse in silence.

These photographs are the beginning of that journey…

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