Ghaggar's surge sparks alarm in Mansa villages

Bathinda: Increased flow in the Ghaggar and rising water levels of Ravi, Beas and Satlju rivers worsened the flood situation in Punjab on Thursday.

The overflowing water of the Ghaggar reached the Sardulgarh area of Mansa after traversing through Mohali, Patiala, and Sangrur districts, prompting farmers to speed up efforts to strengthen the embankments, especially at Chandpura bundh on the border of Punjab and Haryana in Mansa.

Even as people in villages situated close to the Satluj faced the fury of the rising water level, farm leader Avtar Singh Mehma raised questions over not using pebbles collected for flood protection works in villages of Ferozepur close to Sutlej.

Filming a clip at Darweshe Ke village in the Ferozepur sub-division, Mehma showed heaps of pebbles remaining unused despite people from far-off areas arriving with loads of tractor trailers to fill sandbags to prevent erosion of soil and breaches. "A huge amount of money might have been spent on purchasing these pebbles. Authorities should have tied them with wire mesh for strong flood protection works."

At Gatti Rajo Ke village in Ferozepur, close to the international border with Pakistan, the situation remained grim. As the water level increased, people started moving towards safer places. "There were not adequate motorboats to evacuate villagers. One motorboat that arrived had no diesel," said Mohan Singh, a resident of Gatti Rajo Ke.

However, people succeeded in strengthening the embankment at Habib Ke village in Ferozepur, from where soil erosion was reported.

After the water level increased in border villages with over 3 lakh cusecs discharge from Harike and Hussainiwala headworks, Fazilka deputy commissioner Amarpreet Kaur Sandhu and senior superintendent of police Gurmeet Singh reached Teja Rohella village situated close to the international border in a motorboat and asked villagers to shift to safer places.

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