Flash floods triggered by an on-rush of water from the upstream inundated Boro crops on 5,000 hectares of land in 14 haors in Sunamganj, causing a loss of Tk 1.0 billion, according to local agricultural office.
Meanwhile, local farmers claimed some 20,000 hectares of land have been inundated until Friday evening.
According to the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE), farmers yield 6.0 tonnes of paddy from per hectare of land.
As per the DAE estimate, 120,000 tonnes of paddy worth Tk 3.0 billion could have been produced from the land that went under water, claimed local farmers.
Haor is a wetland ecosystem in the north eastern part of Bangladesh which physically is a bowl or saucer shaped shallow depression, also known as a back swamp. During monsoon haors get filled with surface runoff water becoming vast stretches of turbulent water.
According to local DAE office, Boro paddy has been cultivated on 222,000 hectares of land in the district this year and the production target has been set at 1.350 million tonnes.
In a recent visit, the UNB correspondent found local people working day and night voluntarily to protect the local dams. Rain has reduced in haor area but water level in rivers is rising in some upazilas including Dirai-Shalla of Sunamganj.
On April 2, crops of Tanguar haor went under water at first after the Najarkhali dam collapsed.
Since then eight dams collapsed one by one and cracks have been developed in all small and bid dams due to the pressure of upstream water.
On Friday water started flooding Eraliakona Haor in Tahirpur.
Locals said five haors including Chandra Sonartal Haor in Dharmapasha, Tangni Haor in Dirai Upazila and Chapati Haor went under water after collapse of dams.
Bimal Chandra Som, Deputy Director of Sunamganj DAE said water is entering the haors through broken dams and overflowing those in some places.
"The showers have reduced in the last two days. If no more rain occurs there will be no major damage," he assured.
