VELLORE: The officials of government departments and agencies have been on high alert in Vellore following the Indian Meteorological Department’s (IMD) forecasts of heavy rains fall in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, particularly in the catchment areas of inter-state rivers that flow down into the district.
Structures across rivers including check dams and minor dams brimming with water thanks to incessant showers in the recent days.
The Mordhana reservoir in Vellore district has been brimming in the past few days. It has reached 11.5 m water level against full level of 11.6 meter with an inflow of 984 cusecs on Saturday, and a same amount of water is being discharged, sources said.
Since the predicted heavy rains will bring in more amount of flow into the water bodies resulting in flooding and inundation, the district collector A Shanmuga Sundaram asked the officers of concerned government departments and agencies to be on ‘full alert’ for a period of fifteen days.
“As there is an IMD forecast for continuous and heavy rains in Andhra, especially in the catchment areas of Ponnai, Palar, Gundar, Goudanyamahanadhi and Malattar, there will be heavy inflow of water in all these rivers,” he said.
The collector added, “ All officers and engineers of PWD-Water Resources Department, Fire and Rescue Services, Revenue, Rural Development, Health, Police and all local bodies shall be on full alert for the next 15 days.”
The officers are directed to inspect low lying areas either jointly or independently, inspect the ponds, shutters of all lakes and tanks to ensure that there should not be any breaches, besides deputing village administrative officers (VAOs), villages assistants and panchayat secretaries to keep close vigil on the water bodies.
No selfies at water bodies
Apart from issuing possible flood warning over auto-mounted speakers in order to inform the people in low lying areas to migrate to temporary relief centres, the officers are also instructed disallow visitors to water bodies from taking selfies, photos and swimming in water bodies and flooded areas.
Police will be deployed in these places to stop the public from entering and taking selfies that put their lives in risks.
The local bodies and PWD-WRD officers have to keep sufficient stocks of sand at key points near water bodies, that are vulnerable to be flooded, so as to plug breaches if occurs.
Vulnerability mapping
The stakeholders in flood mitigation activities have also been asked to prepare vulnerability mapping for their concerned areas to identify ‘potential hotspots’ of inundation and breaching, necessary equipments including earthmovers and workforce should be kept on prepared mode to attend to emergencies.
An advisory issued to the officers stressed removal of encroachments and blockages on water courses immediately after conducting vulnerability mapping.
Revenue Divisional Officers (RDOs) are instructed to hold Sub-divisional level coordination cum preparedness meeting to discuss the precautionary measures.
Moreover, the Health department is asked to take necessary precautionary measures to prevent waterborne diseases.