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Assam tries to stay afloat
GUWAHATI: Home minister Rajnath Singh went on an aerial survey on Saturday of flood-affected areas in Assam, where at least 26 people have been killed by heavy rains,
GUWAHATI: Home minister Rajnath Singh went on an aerial survey on Saturday of flood-affected areas in Assam, where at least 26 people have been killed by heavy rains, with millions of people displaced.
“I visited certain flood-affected areas of Assam. The situation is grim but CM (Sarbananda Sonowal) and his team are doing well to manage the situation,” Singh said after a meeting to review the situation in the state.
“NDRF teams are working on the ground. The NDRF along with SDRF and army have saved more than 6,000 lives in Assam... The Centre is ready to provide all possible help. I have received a memorandum from the Assam government. An inter-ministerial team will visit Assam soon,” the home minister added.
Singh also said he had asked the state government to “adequately utilise the money in the NDRF”.
Although rainfall decreased as of Saturday, officials in Assam, a tea-growing and oil-rich state, added water levels across rivers were still overflowing. “Overflowing rivers are flooding new areas, making things worse,” said Keshab Mahanta, Assam’s water resource minister.
Authorities in t he state opened more than 800 temporary shelters and food and medicines distribution centres, a senior official at the state disaster management authority said.
Authorities were trying on Saturday to rescue people stranded in flooded areas after a week of heavy rain killed at least 52 people and uprooted thousands of others from their homes in Assam and Bihar.
In other rain-related incidents, at least 30 people were killed after being struck by lightning in different parts of Odisha on Saturday, police said.
Vast tracts of Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, home to the rare one-horned rhino, and another wildlife reserve were under water, the state government said in a statement. Forest officials found the remains of six rhinos drowned by floodwaters in Kaziranga, the statement said. Another rhino was killed in another national reserve in the state.
The Brahmaputra river and its tributaries were overflowing their banks in 18 of Assam’s districts, washing away roads and highways and toppling power pylons. Floodwaters entered homes in at least 14 districts, leading to house collapses.
