India: Photographs from Jason Motlagh Part 2

August 01, 2007 | Pulitzer Center

A lower-caste man treads through a flood pool en route to an aid distribution center in Muzaffarpur district.

A villager bearing a relief package from CARE International listens on as relief workers offer advice on food preparation.

NGOs have dealt out ration cards to ensure the flood-affected families know what aid they’re entitled to and how much.

Ram Thagan, father of 14, has spent the last month living in a tarp tent at the side of the road waiting for a government handout after his village was flooded.

Sub-caste women angry at absence of government help.

Man hustles two 50 kg. sacks of wheat grain, standard issue for a single family, from a government depot.

Tractor driver Pankaj Thakur delivers sacks of rice to government distribution points but says “powerful” village leaders “take lots for themselves.”

Laborers off-load sacks of wheat grain near government storehouse.

Doctor distributes water purification tablets and other medicines to poor flood victims.

Laborers bear sacks of grain across make shift bridge after road was destroyed by flood waters.

A musahar, or “rat-catcher” family, who belong to the lowest sub-caste in Indian society and are often the last to receive help in times of crisis.

Chaitu Sahahi, a 75-year-old fisherman, and his wife say they fled their home six weeks ago and have yet to receive government aid despite living on a main highway.

No stranger to hardship, northern Bihar state – India's poorest and most corrupt – is faced with some degree of flooding each year. But none in distant memory compare to this year's monsoon deluge, a symptom of climate change that has affected tens of millions, killed hundreds and exposed the extent of state neglect rooted in class politics.