Paradip/Jagatsinghpur: It was on this day in 1999 that the Super Cyclone wreaked havoc in the state. Nineteen years down the line, survivors, who lost their near and dear ones, recall the natural calamity that left a trail of destruction and caused irreparable losses.
More than 400 people lost their lives as families got separated and children were orphaned. People are yet to come to terms and the mere thought of what had happened 19 years ago still sends a shiver down their spine; it has left an indelible mark on them.
“If I look back at that day, nothing but a picture of destruction and people dying in front of my eyes comes to the mind,” says Gopal, one of the survivors, who lost his entire family except for his sister whom he has now married off with another survivor Rajaram Pal, who also had been left alone after the death of his seven-member family in the cyclone.
Gopal says he will never forget the day.
“My family used to stay at Sandhakuda. I clearly remember what I did at the news of Super Cyclone. I had left my wife and children at Paradip College. October 29 was a Friday, I was taking my mother and my sister’s family to a cyclone shelter. The situation was nothing if not chaotic everywhere. Everyone was running helter-skelter, we were just about to reach the cyclone shelter, carrying my niece on my shoulder. Unfortunately, everyone was washed away in the flood right in front of my eyes. I could not do anything to save them,” he recounts as tears rolled down his cheeks.
“Before we could realise, a tide measuring as high as 30 metres came gushing towards us and swept us all away. The current was so intense that it took me, my mother, my niece, and my sister’s family members along with it, just before my eyes. I can remember this much only as the next moment I lost my sense,” he further narrates.
Three days later he was rescued by the rescue team from near the boundary wall of PPL plant with no clothes on. He was given food and medicines. As he started feeling a little better, he started searching for his family members.
“I was told I had none from my family left except my sister. My sister was saved because she was caught among the branches of a tree,” he says while staring vacantly towards the sky.
All have started picking up the thread over the years, leaving the traumatic experience behind.
Sudhansu Das also narrated his share of pathetic experience. In fact, Gopal, Rajaram Pal and Sudhansu Das are not the only three who have something to share but hundreds of people who went through the same fate and have many such heartrending stories to tell.
“Everyone in this area has a pathetic recount of that fearful day that they wish not even their enemies would have to go through,” Sudhanshu says.
It’s all in the past now, but the scars still seem fresh and which they will carry all their life, they lament.
PNN