What Happened to India’s Tsunami Victims?

It has been over five years since the Indian Ocean tsunami, but new claims keep arising about the misuse of tsunami relief funds in India. Kovalam in Kerala is trying to attract surfers with a new artificial reef, a project that was strongly opposed by local fishermen. The Hindu newspaper recently reported new allegations about the misuse of funds meant for tsunami victims in Karnataka.

Fishermen on a Kerala Beach

The UK-based responsible tourism organization Tourism Concern has been campaigning for the victims of the 2004 tsunami in India’s Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The organisation says that despite of all the international aid, many of the people displaced by the tsunami are still living in temporary shelters and waiting for the rebuilding of their homes.

When the December 2004 tsunami hit the coastal areas in India’s Tamil Nadu and Kerala, local communities suffered losses of lives but also displacement and loss of traditional livelihood. International aid was sent to both areas. However, according to Tourism Concern, many tsunami victims are still waiting for their homes to be rebuilt, while the funds that were supposed to help displaced families are channelled into tourism development. The Tsunami of Tourism campaign demands that tsunami relief funds should be used to help local fishing and farming communities and displaced families instead of creating new facilities for tourists.

Tsunami Victims in Tamil Nadu

I visited India’s southeast coast a couple of years after the tsunami. As I travelled down the modern East Coast Road coast from Chennai towards Mamallapuram and Pondicherry, I saw miles and miles of makeshift tent camps along the beach. The tents were put together with coconut palm leaves and random bits of plastic, and probably accommodated hundreds of people. In the backpacker resort Mamallapuram, many beach restaurants had drawn black lines on their walls near the ceiling to indicate the height of the water as the waves hit the beach. Businesses had been destroyed, but many had also picked up or started again. 

It has now been over five years since the tsunami. While new resorts have been built on the beaches and the coast has seen a lot of tourism-related development, according to Tourism Concern, whole communities on the coast still live in those temporary shelters.

A Beach in North Kerala

Kerala’s New Artificial Reef

In Kerala, a new artificial reef has been built in Kovalam (an area that was not badly affected by the tsunami) to attract surfers to the area and to turn Kovalam into a year round beach resort. The reef has been funded with money from the central government’s Tsunami Rehabilitation Programme; funds that were meant for rebuilding the lives and livelihoods of communities affected by tsunami, and for rebuilding infrastructure damaged by the disaster. 

Local fishermen opposed the building of the reef and feared it would restrict their fishing area and destroy their livelihood. The reef has been labelled as “coastal protection” but Tourism Concern questions its protective effect, and says it might divert large waves to neighbouring beaches and cause coastal erosion and other damage.

You can read more about the Tsunami of Tourism and the Tsunami Displacement Project here. There is also a slideshow from tsunami-hit areas in India and tips for what a tourist can do to help local communities affected by the disaster.

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