Experts on ways to curb flooding
Lakes encroachments contributing to floods: Experts
Disaster management experts, discussing ways to mitigate urban flooding, called for a state disaster management authority with a full-time vice chairman and a cabinet rank. Besides, they called for the implementation of NDMA guidelines, documentation of events for localised solutions and the implementation of a citizen-centric disaster management plan.
The suggestions were made during a round-table conference ‘Mitigation of Urban Floods and the way forward’ organised by Justice B. Subhashan Reddy Memorial Foundation here on Saturday.
Experts discussed the heavy flooding in 2020, citing faulty planning, unregulated urbanisation, encroachment of natural water channels and lacunae in post-disaster management and preparedness as the main causes.
The event was organised against the backdrop of heavy flooding due to incessant rains over the past fortnight.
Naveen Mittal, Commissioner of Technical
and Collegiate Education, stressed mitigation techniques, watershed development work, rainwater harvesting and more indigenous solutions suitable for the topography of Hyderabad, instead of westernised solutions. He said that increasing concretisation, encroachment of lakes and the overall urban planning model were the contributing factors to submerging the city under rainwater.
B.V. Subha Rao, an international consultant on water and climate change, said, “Specific steps can be taken to prevent flooding in the city, such as early warning
systems like doppler radars and early preparedness. The focus must also be on the six major watersheds in Hyderabad.”
Other speakers — Marri Shashidhar Reddy, former vice-chairperson, NDMA, Prof. Kapil Gupta, water engineering services expert, Iit-bombay, Kota Neelima, director, Institute of Perception Studies, New Delhi, and Prof. Sanjay Ashthana, Fulbright Scholar, Middle Tennessee State University — agreed that urban flooding must be treated as a disaster.
They said that the same can be managed by taking the right steps.