YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy on Wednesday requested the Centre to release an amount of Rs 1,000 crore towards immediate relief and restoration works in the flood-affected areas of Rayalaseema and south coastal Andhra districts.
In a letter written to Union home minister Amit Shah, Jagan said the heavy to very heavy rains caused due to depression in Bay of Bengal on November 18 and 19 caused huge loss to the state to the extent of over Rs 6,000 crore due to damages and loss to the properties and lives.
He said the fourth south coastal and four Rayalaseema districts received an average rainfall of 11.1 cm, as against the normal rainfall of 3.2 cm between November 13 and 20. In a single day, the highest rainfall of 20 cm was recorded at Peddamandyam Mandal in Chittoor district.
Heavy rains lashed temple town Tirupati, Tirumala, Nellore town, Madanapalli, Rajampet town etc., causing inundation of low lying areas and disrupting the normal life. As many as 17 NDRF /SDRF teams and two helicopters had to be deployed for undertaking search and rescue operations.
In all, 40 people including one SDRF constable who was on search and rescue operations died and 25 people are still missing. About 1402 villages in 196 mandals and four towns were affected. As part of relief measures, 324 relief camps accommodating about 69,616 have been arranged in the affected districts and they are still continuing.
Jagan said heavy rains created havoc in the affected districts as the crops in thousands of acres suffered damage. The worst affected were the farmers as the crops that were ready for harvesting were damaged. The cost of the crops damaged and loss to infrastructure is estimated at Rs 6054.29 Crore. As per the preliminary estimate, the following are the damages and losses.
He requested the Centre to come to the rescue of the state by immediately releasing an amount of Rs 1,000 crore as an intern relief so as to provide to relief affected families and to restore the normalcy by undertaking repairs and restoration of damaged infrastructure in the affected districts.
“I also request you to kindly depute Inter Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) at the earliest to assess the damage and losses caused by heavy rains,” he added.
