What am I supposed to do here?

2 days earlier I had arrived at the West Bengal capital of Calcutta in North Eastern India. My task was to coordinate the communication between the local TNT team and the Netherlands based communications department.

In short: TNT India had requested an Emergency Response volunteer to spread the word about their medical relief activities treating a few thousand villagers fallen ill after the cyclone. Off I went, remembering that I read a short article about a natural disaster in Bangladesh and India a few weeks back. But since then nothing has been on the European news. The more eye-opening my visit to the Sundarbans villages was.

I joined a group of Calcutta’s management and spent hours in the car, a rickshaw, the back of a motorcycle and a boat in order to reach villages so badly affected by the storms and floods. Winds of more than 120km/h had literally washed away homes, schools, medical units, fields, fisheries and wells. People were taken by surprise. Luckily the disaster happened at daytime, preventing the loss of thousands of people. Still the aftermath is enormous: 2 million people affected, of which 500,000 left homeless. The victims are confronted with a lack of safe food and drinking water, spreading diseases, no school books, and an uncertain future. Their fields are still logged with saline water and therefore unusable for at least a year. Thousands have tried to leave the area, heading for the 16 million metropolis of Calcutta, in the desperate search for housing and work. Many of them are forced into appalling living conditions, slavery and prostitution. In summary: a human tragedy!

When I returned back to Calcutta, I seriously asked myself what I was supposed to do. My job was to make photo and film material, gather facts and figures, write reports and stories for internal communication. But is that really of use to the people? Yes, it is! Hardly anyone in the Western world is aware of this catastrophe. These people need support from the Indian government, local NGO’s and international aid agencies for a number of years. To raise awareness which will hopefully lead into political pressure as well as funds, someone has to tell the story. Through TNT’s internal communication channel I can reach more than 163,000 employees, who share the news with family and friends. Which newspaper can claim to reach so many readers?