Shah reviews flood preparedness

NEW DELHI: Union home minister Amit Shah on Tuesday held a high-level meeting to review the preparedness to deal with flood situations in the country during the monsoon. He also reviewed long-term measures for the formulation of a comprehensive and overarching policy to mitigate the perennial flood problems in the country, people aware of the matter said.

During the meeting, Shah directed officials to strengthen coordination between central and state agencies to have a permanent system for forecasting floods and the rise in water levels in major catchment zones/ areas, the people added.

The Union minister also advised the Jal Shakti ministry to work out a mechanism for desilting of large dams, which will help in increasing dam storage capacity and flood control.

The meeting comes a day after the ministry of earth science issued a statement predicting rainfall with isolated thunderstorms and lightning over most parts of east, central and northeast India over the next four to five days. According to a statement issued by the home ministry, Shah told the India Meteorological Department (IMD) and the Central Water Commission to use state-of-the-art technology and satellite data for more accurate weather and flood predictions. “He directed to give maximum publicity to various mobile apps related to weather forecasting like ‘Umang’, ‘Rain Alarm’ and ‘Damini’, developed by the IMD,” the statement added.