The district administration had directed the Irrigation Department officials to increase the height of river embankments as a precautionary measure against floods.
Frequent soil erosion and lack of maintenance have damaged embankments in flood-prone areas like Tirtol and Kujang. Following recent rains, new weak points have developed in villages near the river Mahanadi, Paika and Devi.
These weak points have been noticed at the Mahanadi’s left river embankment at Srichandanpur, Paika right embankment at Itaikiri and left embankment at Kulasamantrapur under Tirtol block. Similarly, reports of damage to right embankment of the Mahanadi at Kujang block, left embankments of Devi at Allipada under Biridi block and Garei under Nuagaon block have been received.
Although many of these embankments were damaged in the floods last year, they are yet to be repaired. District Collector Satya Kumar Mallick visited these sites on Monday and urged officials of the Agriculture Department to increase the height of these embankments at the earliest.
Review meet: At a review meeting on flood preparedness on Monday, the District Collector directed officials to keep ready mechanised boats apart from 16 power boats to ferry relief materials in case of floods. Against the requirement of 129 boats, the district currently has 122.
Besides, the Collector directed Civil Supplies officials and BDOs to stock rice, polythene sheets and other relief materials at block and panchayat headquarters. So far, nearly 200 to 500 quintals of rice each has been stocked in block headquarters and 10 quintals each in panchayat headquarters.
SP Satyabrat Bhoi, ADM Surjit Das, Sub-Collector Brajbandhu Bhol and other officials were present in the review meeting.
Comments
0 comment