Evacuation over: NDMA

New Delhi, July 3: National Disaster Management Authority vice-chairman M. Shashidhar Reddy has on Wednesday said that the evacuation in flood-hit Uttarakhand was over.

He said so far 1,08,653 people have been evacuated from the state. Reddy added that over 1,300 villages in Uttarakhand are still cut off from the main roads.

“Some 1,335 villages need to be connected via roads. Over 737 roads have been affected, which needs to be made trans- port-worthy,” Reddy said. According to NDMA’s recent data, rains and floods had affected 4,200 villages in Uttarakhand besides damaging 2,397 houses and 194 bridges.

Reddy said 135 doctors are working in Uttarakhand to help the affected people. “Efforts are being made to provide drinking water by completing all pending schemes by July 10”, he added.

He emphasised on the need for changes in the State Disaster Management Authority to ensure prompt and effective response to any such calamity. “A lot of issues have been thrown up in last few days after the Uttarakhand tragedy. It is to be understood that the state and district administrations have to play a major role in giving a response to any disaster and Centre should support it. There is a law which suggests that the CM should be the head of SDMA and revenue minister and other ministers are members in the authority.” Mr Reddy said. — PTI