The mukhiya (village head) of Ismailpur, Manohar Kumar, 32, would like to get married and settle down. But his desire remains unfulfilled because the block where he lives has so little infrastructure that no one wants to get his or her daughter married to men from the region.
Manohar, a graduate with enough property and cattle, would have been a suitable boy anywhere else. So would have been his deputy and friend, 29-year-old Khantar Mandal. But like three-dozen eligible bachelors in the block, they are yet to married.
“Had we been born anywhere else, we would have got married long ago,” Khantar said.
Getting married, however, is only one of the many problems that the residents of the block encounter everyday. There is no metal road connecting it to the outside world. There is no healthcare facility or school. Recurring floods and soil erosion have added to the woes of the residents.
Murlidhar Singh, the former BJP block president of Ismailpur, told The Telegraph: “We have to travel for more than three hours to reach Naugachia, around 12km away. There are no pucca (permanent) roads. People travel by bullock carts or tongas.”
A primary health centre (PHC) was constructed around three years ago but it has not opened its doors till date. Residents have to rush to the PHC at Gopalpur, around 9km away in case of emergencies.
There is a primary school as well as middle and high schools in Ismailpur but teachers hardly turn up, courtesy the bad roads.
The public health and engineering department has sanctioned around Rs 82 lakh for developing drinking water pipelines in the area. But nothing has happened so far.
Sources said all development work in the area had been stalled because of the fear of floods. But besides waterlogging, no major incident like soil erosion has been reported from the area in the past five years.
A senior district administration officer at Bhagalpur told The Telegraph on condition of anonymity: “The agencies and officials assigned to carry out the development work in Ismailpur have not done so because of the fear of floods. They fear that any work initiated would be washed away by the flood water.”
District magistrate (DM) Narmadeshwar Lal was not available for comment.
Ismailpur block development officer S.M. Parvez Kadri, who has been here posted since July 27, 2011, shared his woeful experience with The Telegraph: “During the monsoon, the entire area turns into an island. At such times, we can only blame the person who created this block.”
Located 27km from the district headquarters, the block was created by then chief minister Lalu Prasad on December 8, 1994. It has a population of around 10,000.
“The block office started functioning on the campus of Naugachia sub-division officer with an aim to help the Ismailpur residents, who earlier had to visit Bhagalpur town. In 2009, then Bhagalpur DM, Bandana Preyashi instructed to shift the block office to Ismailpur,” mukhiya Manohar said.
