BIRTANAGAR, March 18: Fagu Poornima or Holi, the festival of colors, is being observed with much fanfare in the districts of the Tarai region today. The festival, also called the spring festival, marks the arrival of spring and the harvest season.

Nepal’s Tarai plains have always suffered—from floods and inundation during the rainy months, from heat wave during summer and from cold wave during winter months. In almost all the cases people from the low-income bracket—such as Dalits and marginalized communities—have to bear the brunt.  It is no different this winter.

DHANUSA, Nov 3: Chhath festival has concluded today. The festival begins four days after the Tihar festival. The festival begins on Chaturdashi, and concludes by offering argha to the setting sun on Shashti and to the rising sun on Saptami.

When floods and inundations wreak havoc in Nepal’s Tarai plains and elsewhere the issue raised every year is about illegally built structures—dams, embankments, roads etc.

KATHMANDU, July 25: Amid complaints that disputed causeways and embankments constructed by India along the Nepal-India border have been causing inundation across the tarai districts, Former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has stressed the need for diplomatic dialogue with India for resolving the inundation problem.

By far the most affected provinces by recent floods and inundation have been Province 2 and others covering Tarai plains

RAJBIRAJ, July 19: After a high-level aerial inspection of the flood-affected areas led by former Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal drew widespread criticism, a photo showing the provincial ministers' "night inspection" of the Koshi Barrage control room has gone viral.

PANCHTHAR, KHOTANG, July 10: People in the hill districts of Province 1 are compelled to go to expensive hospitals in the tarai for most of their medical needs as local facilities provide only basic medication.

BHAIRAHAWA, July 8: With natural water sources drying up in many parts of Tarai, people are worried that they might have to struggle with drinking water shortages in the days ahead. Tube wells, taps, boring wells and ponds, which in the past have been reliable drinking water sources are drying up fast, they say.

One of the grievances of people living in Tarai plains along the Indian border has been that dams and structures built by India along the border lines have affected their lives.

BANKE, May 10: A heat wave has affected life in some western Tarai districts including the city of Nepalgunj. Nepalgunj recorded highest maximum temperature of 43 degrees Celsius so far on Thursday, according to the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology, Nepalgunj.

KATHMANDU, May 9: Nearly two-thirds of the budget allocated for Kathmandu Terai Expressway has remained unspent.

BIRGUNJ, April 21: Police on Friday lifted the body of Anju Devi Das, 28, of Birgunj Metropolitan City-23 from the cremation site on the banks of the Sirsiya River after they sniffed foul play in her death.

KATHMANDU, April 8: The Tarai-Madhes is facing a growing risk of heat waves.

Reach out to the victims, alleviate the suffering

KATHMANDU, Dec 22: The construction of the fast track linking Kathmandu to Tarai has been found satisfactory. The Nepal Army is tasked to complete the construction of the fast track, a national pride project.

KATHMANDU, Dec 19: Paddy production is projected to grow by 4.8 percent to 5.4 million tons this year. The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development had projected paddy production to grow to this level in 2017. However, only 5.15 million tons of was produced in the year due to late monsoon and floods in Tarai districts.

KATHMANDU, Oct 23: The government has implemented Tarai-Madhes Prosperity Programme in order to run development projects including physical infrastructure in local levels of Tarai-Madhes, enlisted as backward in the human development index, in an integrated manner.

SARLAHI, July 22: Exposure to excessive heat especially during the daytime has challenged the survival of people living in various parts of tarai.

DHANGADHI, July 15:  Every year, floods and landslides affect all nine districts of Province 7. The province faces huge losses of lives and property. While the hill districts of the province are prone to landslides, floods have been devastating the tarai districts.

KATHMANDU, July 12: Paddy transplantation in eastern tarai districts is lower this season compared to other parts of the country. According to the report, paddy transplantation has been done on 30,625 hectares of land in Jhapa, 13,200 hectares in Morang, 11,000 hectares in Sunsari, 8,100 hectares in Saptari and 10,145 hectares in Siraha so far.

BARDIYA, June 27: With the temperature soaring across the country, Ramesh Bhujuwa of Gulariya Municipality-6 is having a hard time these days to manage his livelihood. In order to escape the heat waves, he has left his job. He used to earn his living by selling maize.

SIRAHA, June 25: As the monsoon advances, Pashupati Mukhiya recalls the heavy flooding of last year. A local of Kalyanpur-2 of west Siraha, he bitterly remembered the heavy losses he had to bear after floods in Kamala, Lohajara and Ghuri rivers inundated his village and washed away cattle, crops and destroyed properties.

KATHMANDU, June 21: The government has made preparation to bring Jayanagar-Janakpur-Kurtha and Bathnaha-Biratnagar railways into operation by January next year.

DHANUSHA, June 6: The normal life in the central and eastern tarai has been affected due to scorching heat for the past four-five days now. With the rise in temperature, the heat wave has blown affecting the normal life badly.

KATHMANDU, June 1: Seven months have passed since the government announced housing grants for the victims whose houses were damaged by last year's flooding in the tarai region. According to the announcement, they were to receive grants on par with the earthquake victims. But not a single flood victim has received the grant so far.

KATHMANDU, May 27: The textbooks of at least three subjects are yet to be provided to students in various schools even after six weeks of the beginning of the new academic session which started from April 15.

KATHMANDU, May 15: Federal Parliament lawmakers from province 2 have sought space for Tarai Madhes issues in the upcoming fiscal year's budget.

SIRAHA, March 4: Devaki Thakur, 75, of Brahmapur, Siraha, has seen both good and bad experiences of social untouchability.

March 3: Holi revelers celebrating the festival of color in Kailali (top row) and in Birgunj on Friday. Eighteen tarai districts celebrated the festival on the day.

SIRAHA, March 3: Devaki Thakur, 75, of Brahmapur, Siraha, has seen both good and bad experiences of social untouchability.

KATHMANDU, March 2: Holi, the Hindu festival of colors, is being celebrated across the Tarai region on Friday, amidst much fanfare and merrymaking. The festival is considered as the most important festival in the region after Chath.

RAJBIRAJ, Feb 21: If citizens of India, Bangladesh and other countries want to obtain Nepali citizenship certificate, all they have to do is to visit Saptari and Sunsari districts. These two districts, since a long time, have been a safe haven for international criminals to obtain fake Nepali citizenship certificates.

LAHAN, Jan 28: After the catastrophic earthquake of 2015, locals from various districts of Tarai showered their love on their neighbors from the quake-affected hilly districts by providing relief including cash for them. Now, as the biting cold takes its toll on the lives of the people in Tarai, their neighbors from the hilly districts are doing their best to help them to cope up with it.

KATHMANDU, Jan 27: CPN (UML) general secretary Ishwar Pokharel has said his party was ready to work together with Tarai centric parties and amend the constitution.

KATHMANDU, Jan 23: Dense fog and cold wave have disrupted flights from Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) in Kathmandu to different destinations of the Tarai region.

BIRATNAGAR, Jan 8: Foggy weather along with cold wave continues to adversely affect normal life in all tarai districts for a week now. With one after another person dying due to the frosting cold, the death toll has climbed to 15 within a week.

KATHMANDU, Jan 6: With the temperature continuing to dip each day, the biting cold of the winter has severely affected life in various districts in the tarai region. Cold has especially hit hard Saptari, Mahottari and Siraha of the tarai belt.

BIRATNAGAR, Jan 4: Since the last two days, westerly winds have caused dense fog in the tarai districts crippling lives of the common people. Schools, shops and markets have been closed in major areas due to the unbearable cold.

RAUTAHAT, Dec 20: With the sudden dip in temperature, thick fog has started blanketing various parts of Rautahat and other districts in the Tarai crippling the normal life.

JANAKPUR/BIRGUNJ, Dec 17: Dipping temperature has started to hit the normal life of people in Tarai. Schools, colleges, public offices stopped operating since Friday due to cold weather.

BUTWAL, Nov 17: Established politician Brijesh Kumar Gupta had won the previous two Constituent Assembly (CA) elections from the then constituency-3 of Kapilvastu district. At that time, he was representing Tarai-Madhesh Loktantrik Party, which later went on to merge with five other fringes Madhesi parties to form Rastriya Janata Party Nepal (RJPN) just a few months ago.

KATHMANDU, Nov 13: The government needs to spend Rs 73 billion for reconstruction and restoration of livelihoods in areas of central and eastern tarai damaged by floods of mid-August, according to a Post-Flood Recovery Needs Assessment Report prepared by the National Planning Commission (NPC).

KATHMANDU, Oct 31: Non-life insurance companies have been too slow to settle insurance claims made for damages incurred in recent floods in several Tarai districts.

RAJBIRAJ, August 29: Three people have died from snakebites in two weeks in Saptari district in the aftermath of the massive floods.

KATHMANDU, August 22: The recent incessant monsoon rains, which triggered massive floods in tarai and landslides in other parts of the country, have added an element of uncertainty to the growth outlook for Fiscal Year 2017/18, according to Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB).

RAUTAHAT, August 21: Shiva Dayal Sah, 60, of Dohartol panics whenever clouds gather in the sky. He has withstood flood several times in his life. However, the recent one, the one that swept across most the Tarai region last Saturday, was the most devastating, he says. “As soon as there is a black cloud in the sky I feel like fleeing from here. I get very restless,” he said. “I fear if I could save my life again if my house is flooded again,” he added.

KATHMANDU, August 20 President Bidya Devi Bhandari has urged the government and three major parties to work together to find solutions to the recurrent problems of flooding and other natural disasters.

Eastern Nepal is in utter pain at present due to the floods and landslides triggered by incessant rainfall.

KATHMANDU, Aug 18: Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) benchmark index fell 12.98 points this week to close at 1,629.75 points on Thursday, the last trading day of the week.