Is Govt ready for 12-day rains in July?
We’re ready, no need to panic: Minister
The weathermen have predicted rains in Kashmir for 12 continuous days in July but government has asked people not to panic and promised to avert any resulting crisis.The weather forecasters predicted moderate to heavy rains from July 14 to July 25, creating uneasiness among the people of Kashmir who are yet to recover from the devastation of the September 2014 floods.
Three hundred people were dead and over 3 lakh structures damaged in last year’s floods and the government is yet to rehabilitate the flood-affected people.
Director of the local Meteorological department, Sonam Lotus said these weather predictions were being made on weather forecasting websites and may keep changing.
However, he said continuous rains for 12 days could not be ruled out but unless the Meteorological department was pretty sure, it could not raise alarm.
In September 2014, the Meteorological department had raised alarm well in time but the government had failed to gear its machinery resulting in panic and crisis.
Talking to us, Minister of State (MoS) for Public Health Engineering, Irrigation and Flood Control, Abdul Majid Padder said the government will try to avert any resulting crisis if Kashmir witnesses rains for 12 continuous days.
“We’ll try and we’re ready,” Padder said. “There is no need to panic as entire government machinery is geared up to meet any eventuality.”
The minister said the government was carrying de-siltation of the River Jhelum as well and flood channel.
After the floods, the State government sent Rs 44,000 crore proposal to Government of India (GoI) for the rehabilitation of flood-affected people and traders.
After nine months of the floods, GoI finally announced a financial assistance but the assistance amount of Rs 1667 crore has left people disappointed.
Political parties, civil society groups and trade bodies termed the GoI’s financial package as a “crude joke”.
Chief Engineer, Irrigation and Flood Control, Mir Javed Jaffer said currently River Jhelum has a water carrying capacity of 35,000 to 40,000 cusecs and if there would be a discharge more that, handling it would be a problem.
He said though the government was carrying de-siltation of River Jhelum and flood channel, there was also a need to carry de-siltation of the catchment areas, which retain flood waters and delay their flow into the river or the flood channel.
“In March, we had a flow of 37,000 cusecs of water and recently we had a flow of 42,000 to 44,000 cusecs,” Jaffer said.
