Central team to visit West Bengal today for ground assessment of Cyclone Amphan impact

New Delhi/Kolkata/IBNS: Almost 15 days after severe cyclonic storm Amphan devastated large parts of the coastal districts of West Bengal, an Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) will arriving on Thursday for making ground level assessment of the damages, sources in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said on Wednesday late night.

An official in the Union Home Ministry said that the seven-member IMCT led by MHA Joint Secretary (Cyber Information Security), Anuj Sharma, will arrive at Kolkata airport by an Air India flight at around 6:30 pm. on Thursday and after completing the on-spot assessments of Amphan-hit districts, the team will leave the city at 8:25 pm. on Saturday.

According to MHA officials, besides Anju Sharma,Ministry of Agriculture Farmers Welfares director Narendra Kumar, Department of Fisheries Assistant Commissioner R.P. Dubey, Department of Expenditures Director (FCD) S.C. Meena, Ministry of Jal Shaktis Sup. Engineer (Coord) Sidhartha Mitra, Ministry of Powers director Rishika Sharan, and the Executive Engineer (SG) of Ministry of Road Transport Highways, Samiran Saha, will be the members of the central team.

Meanwhile,Deputy Secretary to the West Bengal governments Disaster Management Civil Defence department has asked all the police and administrative officials of the respective districts to provide all necessary support and facilities to the central delegation during their visit.

Earlier on May 20, severe cyclonic storm Amphan hit several districts of south Bengal, including Kolkata, South and North 24 Parganas, Howrah, East and West Medinipur, and Hooghly, with very high wind speeds ranging up to 155-165 kmph gusting to 185 kmph and left a large part of those districts completely or somewhere partly devastated.

Days after the storm, Prime Minister Narendra Modi conducted a joint aerial survey of the cyclone-hit areas with Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and released an immediate relief package of Rs 1000 crore to the state.