Role of Government in Ensuring Safe Drinking Water after a Natural Disaster - A Case Study of Kerala Flood

Floods are one of the major natural disasters, resulting in the contamination of drinking water sources such as ground water and drinking water. Kerala had an abnormally high rainfall during 1st June 2018 to 19th August 2018. It resulted in the heavy loss of life and many people were evacuated and nearly one sixth of the total population were affected. Contamination of drinking water by floods results in water-borne illnesses. Alappuzha district of Kerala was one of the worst hit districts by flood. Economically backward sections of the population are usually more affected by any natural disaster particularly flood. Hence a study was made on the socio-economic status of the flood affected people and role of government in ensuring safe drinking water. The water samples were collected from the ground water sources (wells) of flood affected Mannar panchayath of Chengannur taluk. The water quality of households affected due to flood were subjected to various physico-chemical and microbiological analysis. Also the quality of water collected from flood affected areas were calculated using two indices - WQI and OPI. Based on the results, the recommendations were made to improve the performance of the government in ensuring safe drinking water after a flood.