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Bihar: Efforts on to plug breaches as floods hit over 24 lakh in 11 districts

PATNA: The number of flood-hit people in 11 north Bihar districts increased from 14.95 lakhs on Sunday to a whopping 24.43 lakhs in the last 24 hours as the engineers of water resources department (WRD) were trying to plug the breaches in the retired line embankment on the swollen Gandak at four places in Baikunthpur block of Gopalganj district.




WRD is also on alert in West Champaran, Gopalganj and adjacent districts following downpour in the catchment area of Gandak in Nepal. Water resources minister Sanjay Kumar Jha said the discharge from Valmikinagar barrage in West Champaran is likely to surge from 2.20 lakh cusecs as on Monday evening up to 3.72 lakh cusecs in the next 48 hours. Jha conceded that Burhi Gandak and Bagmati rivers remained turbulent in Khagaria, Begusarai and Darbhanga districts.

The Gandak, which flows into Bihar from Nepal, has breached its embankments at 10 places in Gopalganj (9) and East Champaran (1) districts. Three breaches were reported at two places in the Saran embankment of Gandak river in Baikunthpur block of Gopalganj district on Saturday. Earlier, breaches in the embankment of Gandak were reported at three more places last Thursday night — two in Gopalganj and one in East Champaran.

WRD engineers at Patna claimed that efforts were on to plug the breaches. “Repair work is underway from both ends of the damaged embankments. Thankfully, the river current is not much, which is favourable for carrying out embankment restoration works,” a senior WRD official said.

As per daily flood bulletin issued by WRD on Monday evening, Bagmati, Burhi Gandak, Khiroi and Adhwara group of rivers were flowing above the danger level. Except Burhi Gandak and Bagmati at a few places, most other rivers flowing in north Bihar were showing either receding or static trend.

With regard to flood relief works, three helicopters of Indian Air Force airdropped food packets in the worst affected areas in Darbhanga, Gopalganj, East Champaran and Madhubani districts. Besides, 12.858 people were staying in 29 flood relief camps. Altogether 703 community kitchens were functional in different districts.

Nitish: Keep vigil on embankments


CM Nitish Kumar on Monday instructed water resources department secretary Sanjeev Hans to keep the engineers on alert mode on the embankments under pressure from floodwaters. He also issued a slew of instructions to principal secretary (disaster management) Pratyaya Amrit to ensure quality flood relief works, including better relief camps and sufficient number of community kitchens. He also asked him to ensure that all preventive norms with regard to Covid-19, including the distribution of free face masks, are adhered to in the relief camps. Nitish asked the WRD officials to keep flood fighting materials in sufficient quantity on embankments, so that emergency repair work could be carried out in any unforeseen circumstances.

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