- Floods have affected around 5 million people across 15 districts of Bihar, even as the state records a 35% rainfall deficit.
- Experts say intense rainfall later in the monsoon, saturated soils and degraded catchments can contribute to flooding even when seasonal rainfall is below normal.
- Farmers have lost crops and homes, with repeated flooding also pushing young people to migrate for work.
Geeta Devi is a resident of Gandhi Tola in Manihari, Katihar district, Bihar, one of the 15 districts worst hit by this year’s floods. Waist-deep water fills her three-room mud house, which is still standing. But she isn’t sure how long it will hold. She has kept her valuable belongings in an elevated place. Almost every day, the 35-year-old farmer braves the water to go from her makeshift shelter to her house check how much the water has risen and whether her things are safe.
Geeta’s husband is in Delhi where he works as a daily-wage labourer, leaving her in charge of the flooded household, agricultural field, livestock and her four children.
Scale of the losses
Bihar is facing severe flooding, with the Ganga and several other rivers flowing above the danger mark.
The Kosi is flowing above the danger mark at Baltara and Kursela, while the Budhi Gandak is above the mark at Khagaria. The Ganga is above the danger mark at Digha, Gandhi Ghat, Hathidah, Bhagalpur, Kahalgaon and Munger. The Punpun is above the mark at Paliganj, while the Bagmati and Ghaghra are above the danger mark at Benibad and Darauli.
The floods have affected 15 districts of Bihar, with almost 50 lakh (5 million) people affected across 88 blocks and 575 gram panchayats, according to the state government’s press release dated September 14, 2026.
Geeta is now sitting with her four children on a raised embankment beside the railway tracks. A small patch of cut grass lies nearby, where a goat is grazing. A little farther away, cattle are tied up. “There were around 400 houses here. Everything is under water,” she says. “The water towards the fields has risen so much that we do not dare to go there by boat.”
The state government says that, as part of flood relief, 1,260 community kitchens have served close to 120 lakh (12 million) thalis (set meals) so far. The government has also set up 13 relief camps housing 11,060 people, and distributed about 400,000 tarpaulin sheets, around 73,100 dry-food packets, and 1,400 food packets.
But Geeta Devi is not part of the statistics. “We have not received anything from the government. We bought everything ourselves,” she says.
“Now that we don’t have a house, where will we stay? How long can we stay out here with the children?” she says. Geeta borrowed ₹1,500 to buy bamboo and a tarpaulin for the temporary shelter.
How did Bihar flood in a rain-deficit year?
Bihar is India’s most flood-prone state. About 73% of its area is flood-prone. In North Bihar, seven in every 10 people are affected by floods.
But this year, the situation was different. Bihar has an overall 35% rainfall deficit, while Uttar Pradesh has a 3% deficit.
This year’s flood in Bihar did not follow the usual script.
“What usually causes floods in Bihar are the rivers originating from Nepal, the Kosi, Gandak, Burhi Gandak, Bagmati and their tributaries. When they come down into north Bihar, their runoff is very high, and it causes flooding,” says Dinesh Kumar Mishra, an author on books regarding Bihar’s water challenges.
“This year, given the devastating flash flood in Nepal, we thought it would have a heavy impact in Bihar,” he says.
It didn’t. “What actually caused the flood was heavy rainfall in the later months of the monsoon in UP and Bihar. This was all very surprising for us,” he says.
Himanshu Thakkar, coordinator of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People, explains, “Initially the monsoon rainfall was very low in U.P. and Bihar. In July and parts of August, rainfall was considerably higher, particularly on different days. It is showing its impact now.”
“In the initial monsoon period, the soil is also generally dry. So a lot of the moisture gets absorbed into the soil. But by the later part of the monsoon, the soil becomes saturated. So, whatever additional rainfall there is, it adds up as flood,” he adds.
Thakkar argues, “Catchment is degrading, which means visible deforestation, destruction of local water bodies. All of this reduces the catchment capacity to hold water.”
“So because of the high deterioration of catchments, the rainfall is converting into runoff very fast. So, these are the reasons why you are seeing it particularly in Bihar.”
Thakkar adds that the flood situation immediately depends on the Farakka situation. The Farakka Barrage is a 2.4 km embankment built on the Ganga River to divert its water into the Hooghly. It has repeatedly been blamed for floods in Bihar.
“Once Farakka gets filled and backwater is there, then the water from the river finds it very difficult to drain out. That creates a flood situation even when the rainfall is not very high, particularly along the Ganga and its main tributaries. Then, debris, soil, silt and sedimentation accumulate. So, this situation is going on particularly in Bihar, and this happens particularly in the second half of the monsoon, when Farakka’s situation is full.”
Villages are left on their own
A few kilometres from Manihari, as Mongabay-India travelled away from the river, as soon as we entered the rural area, all we could see were submerged fields stretching on both sides of the Katihar highway, while villagers were either building makeshift shelters along the roadside or reserving a spot.
Pradeep Kumar Mandal, 60, sits outside his home in Hanswar village, Katihar, looking at the submerged fields around him. His family of four depends entirely on farming.
“We planted paddy and maize this year. Everything was destroyed,” says Mandal, who farms eight acres. “This year the water came too early.”
A former sarpanch of Kewala panchayat, he estimates around 1,000 acres of farmland have been damaged across his village of 600 households. “Everywhere the situation is the same,” he says. This year alone, he lost ₹1 lakh. “I no longer have the courage to farm next year.”
No flood relief has reached the village. Relief camps, Mandal says, are set up in the town, never in the villages.
A few kilometres away, Sudesh Mahato, 65, a daily-wage labourer, is building a makeshift hut. His family of 12 lives here, but all his sons have migrated for work.
“Look, that is my house,” he says from the highway, pointing to a mud house with a tin shed. “Tomorrow, water will enter.” He says it with certainty. “Just wait one week. The whole village will be on both sides of the road.”
Limited information
Bihar’s official figures don’t say how much farmland is under water, how many crops have been lost, or how many cattle have died. They don’t say how many houses are damaged, people died or missing.
But the state’s own disaster management Standard Operating Procedure requires all of this to be collected during the initial damage assessment, along with dated photos and video.
Asked why crop damage figures were missing from the public data, Avinash Kumar, Joint Secretary in Bihar’s Disaster Management Department, said, “The agriculture department was still assessing the extent of the damage and would release the figures once the floodwater receded.”
Asked about deaths, he said no human deaths had been reported so far, and that one or two cattle had died.
“Bihar Disaster Management is giving out very little information about the extent of the damage and loss,” says Eklavya Prasad, managing trustee of Megh Pyne Abhiyan (MPA), an organisation working on water and sanitation.
Without knowing the scale of the damage, he argues, there is no way to calculate what people are actually losing.
MPA conducted a household-level flood loss assessment after the 2024 floods. “We surveyed 2,290 households across seven districts,” he says. “Together, these 2,290 households incurred a total loss of ₹1.26 billion. The average loss per household was ₹5.51 lakh (₹551,000). Half the households surveyed lost more than ₹2.11 lakh (₹211,000), and half lost less.”
He added that after the floods, often as late as September, October, or November, families get a flat cash payout that has no link to actual losses. “By the time a family recovers from one flood,” Prasad says, “the next one has already arrived.”
In neighbouring Jharkhand, the damage is the same
Across the Ganga river, from Banihari, Katihar, to Sahebganj district, the damage in neighbouring Jharkhand is similar.
It’s been weeks since the Ganga flooded and engulfed Pintu Yadav’s agricultural field in Lal Bathani village, Mahadevganj block, Sahebganj District of Jharkhand.
A tractor has been brought down close to the field, and 32-year-old Pintu, along with his entire family, has been working since early morning, trying to save as much of the crop as they can. His uncle moves around on a makeshift boat, checking which parts of the field still have crops worth recovering.
Pintu stands neck deep in the water, ducking under to cut bundles of the fodder crop with a sickle, and the man standing beside him lifts each bundle out and loads it onto the tractor.
Water has submerged both the agricultural land and the grazing ground. “That is at least 3 acres of fodder crop gone underwater; the loss is around ₹3 lakh (₹300,000),” he says, a figure that includes the other losses he incurred due to the flood.
Pintu is one of many farmers in the region whose home and land go under every year in the annual flood.
The damage is similar to what we have seen in neighbouring Bihar. Bijay Kumar, Additional Collector (ADC), Sahebganj, says that around 45,000 families are likely to have been affected by the floods across five blocks, 38 panchayats and 68 villages. Relief camps have been set up in Rajmahal and Sahebganj, and one platoon of the NDRF has been deployed in the district. Kumar says the extent of crop and property damage can only be assessed once the water level returns to normal. No human or livestock deaths have been reported so far.
When asked about the relief villagers had received, Saiba Bano, a resident of Mahadevpur, Sahebganj says they were given 5 kg of chura (flattened rice), two candles and one bheli or 200 g of jaggery. “Our entire house is submerged. We are living on the roof. How many days will 5 kg of chura last?” she says.
For families on both sides of the Ganga, the water will eventually recede. But the crop losses, damaged homes, debt and migration will remain long after the floodwater is gone.
Geeta will rebuild her house.
Until the Ganga rises again.
Banner image: Geeta Devi mud house remains partially submerged in flood water. She worries how long it would hold. Image by Ashwini Kumar Shukla.