VIJAYAWADA: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Jaganmohan Reddy has sent a communication to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, seeking an emergency flood relief of '1,000 crore.
The chief minister requested the Centre to send a central team to assess the flood damage in the state.
“Heavy rains caused a loss of '6.54 lakh crore,” he said.
Jagan said heavy rains lashed the temple town of Tirupati, Tirumala, Nellore, Madanapalli, Rajampet etc.
“There was inundation of low-lying areas and disruption of normal life. As many as 17 NDRF / SDRF teams and two helicopters were deployed for search and rescue operations. Some 40 people including an SDRF constable on search and rescue operations died and 25 persons were reported missing,” the Chief Minister said.He stated that about 1402 villages in 196 mandals and four towns were affected.
As part of relief, 324 camps accommodating about 69,616 affected people have been arranged in the affected districts.
Several highways, irrigation tanks and canals got breached or damaged at several places in Kadapa, Chittoor, Anantapur and Nellore districts.
Heavy inflows to the Buggavanka rivulet cutting through Kadapa city worsened the situation.
The Somasila reservoir in Pennar basin received heavy inflows of more than 5 lakh cusecs during 48 hours, causing inundation of low-lying areas in Nellore town and Kovvur in the district, the CM stated.
He said, this apart, the Annamayya reservoir in Kadapa district got breached and a railway track between Nandaluru and Hastavaram was badly damaged. Swarnamukhi was in spate, submerging the road between Kovvur and Nellore, causing traffic disruption on highways.
The Chief Minister said farmers were the worst-hit due to the damage caused to harvest-ready crops, the loss of which was estimated at '6054.29 crore.
As per the preliminary estimate, agriculture crops were damaged in 1.43 lakh hectares and horticulture crops in 42,299 hectares. Roads of 1887.65 km in Nellore, Kadapa, Chittoor and Ananthapur districts were damaged. Power feeders, water schemes and amenities were also massively damaged, he said.
The CM added, “I request the Government of India to come to the rescue of the state in this hour of crisis and immediately release an amount of ' 1000 crore as an intern relief to affected families. Kindly depute an Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) at the earliest to assess the damage and losses caused by heavy rains.”
