AP Govt Swift Response To Rains Helped Tackle Flood Situation Better

27 Nov, 2021 08:36 IST|Sakshi Post

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the State Government has been taking all the relief and rescue measures without lapses and provided compensation to affected families in the floods within one week of the calamity while the Opposition is trying to politicize the issue.

The Chief Minister told the House that Kadapa, Chittoor, Ananthapur, and Nellore districts were badly affected by heavy rains and floods like never before, yet the opposition parties are trying to politicise the issue and raise objections for not visiting the flood-hit areas. The Chief Minister explained that he very much wanted to visit the affected districts, but the senior officials negated, as it could hamper the relief works since the rescue operations are need of the hour. He stated that an aerial survey was done, also relief works are being constantly reviewed and assured to personally visit the flood-affected areas. The neighbouring Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik effectively monitors such situations from his office.

He said that all the district authorities are involved in relief works and are being supervised by Ministers and elected representatives of the respective areas and all the compensations were promptly paid to the affected within a week of the damage, unlike the previous government where compensation was paid only after months together.

Responding to the opposition leader Chandrababu’s remarks of ‘CM will come in the air, go in the air,’ the Chief Minister said that it is not sensible to make such harsh statements for a leader with 40 years experience.

The Chief Minister said that the flash flood was caused due to unprecedented heavy rains in a short span of time, which led to the flooding of villages downstream of Pincha and Annamayya reservoirs on Cheyyeru following a breach to its bund and stated the government is not hiding the human loss or property loss. Elaborating the nature's fury, he explained that at 8.30 am on November 18, the Pincha project had inflows of just 3,845 cusecs and by 8.30 pm, they increased to 90,464 cusecs. Right from 8 am, almost 51 mandals of Kadapa district received an average rainfall of 10.7 cm, and heavy rains lashed Seshachalam Hills in Tirupati and other parts of Chittoor district, which led to heavy inflows at Cheyyeru. 

As the discharge capacity of Pincha is only 58,000 cusecs and the inflows are over 1.38 lakh cusecs, there occurred a breach at Pincha, where all the water gushed downstream to Annamayya project. By the wee hours of November 19, the inflows to Annamayya reservoir crossed 3.2 lakh cusecs, while its discharge capacity was only 2.17 lakh cusecs, which resulted in a breach to the project, causing unfortunate damage. He said that the officials have alerted the villages and immediately taken over the rescue operations by shifting 400 families to safe places and providing shelter to 900 people in relief camps, saving hundreds of people with their efforts.

The Chief Minister said that four buses were stuck in the flood, where an RTC bus had fallen from Nadaluru bridge, where 10 people succumbed to death and the rest were rescued by SDRF teams. Also, 10 others died at Sivalayam which is on the banks of the river. A total of1990 villages in 119 mandals of four districts were affected by the floods, of which 211 villages were completely inundated causing a death toll of 44 people and while 16 are still missing. He said that 1169 houses were completely damaged and 5434 houses were partially damaged.

He said that a dedicated control room was set up and food staples along with safe drinking water were supplied to 95949 families of the flood-affected areas. Besides these, Rs 2,000 was given to each family, and an ex gratia of Rs 5 lakh was given to the kin of the deceased. Further, he stated that the government is paying compensation for the loss of 5286 livestock and organising medical camps of about 653, along with veterinary camps.
In regard to property loss, the Chief Minister said that the government is paying up to Rs 5200 for each of 5434 partially damaged houses and Rs 95,000 for each of 1169 fully damaged houses. Besides these, an addition of Rs 1.8 lakh is being sanctioned for the construction of new houses. Rs 84 crore was released for immediate use to the District Collectors. He said that crop loss enumeration is being done and soon shall take up road repair works. The government is going to focus on the safety of irrigation projects in the State, to avoid a repeat of the Annamayya project breach-like incident, through automation by monitoring the water flows on a real-time basis. 

The Chief Minister said that the previous government neglected the projects without increasing the discharge capacity of the reservoirs and now misleading the public by blaming the government. 

He affirmed that the government has been providing all compensation with utmost transparency without any corruption.

Also Read: ​AP Assembly Adjourned Sine Die

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