PATNA: In a first in Bihar, the state government has decided to set up an automatic weather station in all the 534 blocks and the rain gauge devices in all the 8,406 panchayats in order to fight against a natural disaster like drought. All these have been planned to get help in real time assessment of quantity and intensity of rainfall annually.
Besides these, the state government has also decided to sign an MoU with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in order to get technical support in fighting against natural disasters through advance managements.
The ISRO will help the state government’s concerned department in real-time monitoring of flood or drought-like situation and provide data and satellites supports in an emergency situation.
At present, Bihar is facing acute shortage of potable water in major parts of it terrains with all the underground levels of water gone drastically down rendering lakhs of water hand pumps dry and defunct.
All the traditional ponds, water reservoir even in the flood-prone north Bihar have dried up and millions of residents are forced to fetch water from far off places. According to a rough figure, 105 blocks in 19 districts of Bihar have become critical in shortage of water included Darbhanga, Muzaffarpur, Vaishali
and other districts.
Recently, chief secretary Deepak Kumar had visited Darbhanga to take stock of emerged water crisis in city, where once highest numbers of water bodies were exiting. The water levels in the majority of districts have gown down from 30 to 45 feet down and if this situation persists for a longer time, availability of water in state would be reduced to 635quibic only by 2050.
In the old days in the state, around 2.5 lakh water ponds were exiting, which have now reduced to only 93000 now. In Darbhanga alone, there were 213 ponds and other water bodies till 1963 and now only 84 are existing. The Asia famous Kanwar water lake in Begusarai, which is also a bird sanctuary, spread in 15,800 acres of wetland areas is also getting dry up and reduced to 2500 acres.
Darbhanga based Kusheshwar asthan- bird sanctuary cum water body is also decaying alarmingly and the majority of its areas have dried up.