Floods ease, 90k hit; alert in Gadchiroli

Nagpur: The floods which finally abated on Tuesday have left more than 90,000 persons affected in the region. Out of these, more than 47,000 had to be rescued and shifted to safer locations, according to divisional commissioner Sanjeev Kumar who participated in a review meeting with the state minister for disaster relief Vijay Wadettiwar.
Sources said there is no updated information about loss of lives and this is not being ruled out.Information is being gathered on the likely casualties, they added.
At the meeting, the divisional commissioner said 138 shelter homes have been set up in the affected districts where 9,000 people have been accommodated. Sources said rest of the rescued persons were taken to safer locations close to their villages itself or sites other than the shelter homes.
Wadettiwar said this was the worst flood in the last 100 years and has led to a major damage to property, crops, roads, bridges and livestock. He directed the officials to prepare a report to assess the damage on a war footing and submit it to the ministry of relief and rehabilitation.
The minister also issued directions to ensure supply of food, clean water, restoration of power supply and road repairs in the affected areas.
The water flow in Gosikhurd dam on the Wainganga river has reduced to 5,300 cubic meters per second (cumecs), which is much within the normal levels. The discharge from Pench and Kanhan rivers near Nagpur has also reduced to 1,500 cumecs in all.
The discharge had reached 29,000 cumecs and 6,600 cumecs in Wainganga and Pench, respectively. Gadchiroli remains to be under alert as water from these rivers has increased the flow in rivers in the district.
There were reports of flood waters receding in all the affected districts of Nagpur, Bhandara, Gondia and Chandrapur. A flood alert has been issued in Gadchiroli.
At present, 34,000 cubic meters per seconds (cumecs) of water is being discharged from the Chisdoh barrage in Gadchiroli district. This is much more than what was flowing out of the Gosikhurd dam during the flood.
Sources said that the situation was under control because there were no rains in Gadchiroli since last one week. However, the water flowing from the northern districts has led to a massive discharge in Gadchiroli.
The water will finally flow into Godavari river down south. It has enough capacity to accommodate the discharge. Road connectivity remains to be hampered in Gadchiroli district.
A decision to withdraw the national disaster relief force (NDRF) and state disaster relief forces (SDRF) teams from the affected areas has been taken as local units would now be able to carry out the remaining relief works, said an official monitoring disaster relief at the division level.
A press release by the defence spokesperson said that at Bramhapuri taluka of Chandrapur some of the villagers refused to leave their homes citing poor condition at the shelter homes. The note also claimed that there was no clarity about the compensation apart from uncertainty about livestock.
The villagers agreed after the civil administration reassured them. The army has rescued 104 persons along with some livestock, said the press release.
Disaster management officers in Bhandara and Gondia said that the situation was under control and relief operations were being wound up. There were similar reports from Nagpur too with officials claiming that the rescued persons were slowly returning to their villages from shelter homes.
In Chandrapur, the water level had receded by six feet and rescue operations have been stopped. Among the last to be rescued were 150 families from Tok village in Pombhurna tehsil.