CM undertakes aerial survey of flood-hit areas, announces relief
Bhubaneswar: People in the flood-hit districts of the state continued to suffer for the fifth day on Monday as the Mahanadi river system and its tributaries and distributaries remained swollen.
Although the flow of water from the Hirakud dam reservoir has reduced, the Mahanadi river system will need another four days to stabilise, provided there is no further rainfall.
Chief minister Naveen Patnaik, who undertook an aerial survey of the flood-affected areas on Monday, announced relief measures, including cooked and dry food for all the people who have been evacuated and housed in shelters. Fifty kg of rice and Rs 500 each will be provided to all families in the villages that have been severely affected in the floods. Besides, one polythene sheet will be provided to each household whose house has been damaged.
The CM also announced house damage assistance as per the State Disaster Relief Fund norms. Collectors will take steps to assess house damage within 15 days and disburse the assistance in the next 7 days.
The floods have affected over 14.5 lakh people and damaged over 10,000 houses in Puri, Cuttack, Kendrapada and Jagatsinghpur districts. Distributaries of the Mahanadi like Devi, Daya, Bhargavi, Kusabhadra, Luna and Khirosrota continue to flow in spate.
In several areas, road communication has been cut off and people left marooned. Vast stretches of agriculture fields have been submerged and crops in over 1.68 lakh hectare have got affected by the floodwaters.
At present, 5.98 lakh cusec of water is being released from the Hirakud reservoir per second through 36 sluice gates, against an inflow of 5.16 lakh cusec per second. The release of water from the Hirakud decreased sharply from nine to seven lakh cusec per second earlier on Monday.
Thankfully, there has been no major rainfall in the upstream areas of the dam in the past 24 hours. “Thus, the release of water from the Munduli barrage to the downstream areas will also decrease,” said Jyotirmaya Rath, engineer-in-chief of water resources department.
Different rivers caused 36 embankment breaches so far, including five in the Mahanadi river system. Several villages in Banki in Cuttack, Bari in Jajpur and Kanasa block in Puri still have waist-deep water.
The India Meteorology Department (IMD) has forecast more rain for the state. Director of the regional IMD centre H R Biswas said rainfall activity in the state might increase for three days from Tuesday due to a trough line. He said there was a chance of heavy rainfall in isolated places during this period. “There is chance of heavy to very heavy rainfall in isolated places in 11 districts on Wednesday and yellow warning of heavy rain has been issued for eight districts on Tuesday,” the IMD bulletin said.