12.5 lakh families affected; Detailed memo of damages, relief package being readied: CS
SRINAGAR: The state government on Monday said the preliminary assessment of cumulative losses due to floods in the state was in excess of Rs 1,00,000 crore and expressed hope that the Centre will go out of its way to provide succour to the affected people.
“The losses due to floods including the (private) businesses is in excess of Rs one lakh crore,” state Chief Secretary Mohammad Iqbal Khandey told reporters.
Addressing a press conference here, Chief Secretary said that never before has such a disaster struck Jammu and Kashmir and such flood level has never been recorded. He said across the State, 12.5 Lakh families have been affected due to flood and damages to public and private property is estimated to be running in thousands of crore.
Divulging details the Chief Secretary said that 5642 villages were affected across the state with 2489 in Kashmir valley and remaining in Jammu division. He said as many as 800 villages remained sub-merged for over two weeks. He said 281 lives have been lost due to floods with 196 lives lost in Jammu province and 85 in Kashmir valley. 29 persons have also been reported missing in the floods, he added.
The Chief Secretary said the state government was in the process of preparing a detailed memorandum of losses due to floods which shall be submitted to the Centre by this weekend.
“We are in the process of preparing the memo. It will be approved by the Cabinet and should be sent to the Centre by the weekend,” he said. “We are extremely optimistic that the Government of India will go out of its way to provide succour to the affected people,” Khandey said.
Mr Khandey said as per the initial assessment reports received by the Government on the damages to the private property, a total of 353864 structures have been reported damaged. He said 83044 pucca houses have been fully damaged and 96089 partially. Similarly, 21162 kachha houses have been fully damaged and 54264 partially damaged besides 99305 huts, cowsheds, etc have also been damaged.
He said as per the initial assessments, crops have suffered damages to the tune of Rs. 6611 crore including Rs. 4043 crore to Agricultural and Rs. 1568 crore to Horticulture crops besides 6.51 lakh Ha land has been affected due to floods. In addition, 10050 milch animals and 33000 sheep / goats have perished in the floods. He said public utilities and infrastructure including roads, water supply schemes, irrigation, power etc have also been damaged and losses to these sectors assessed at Rs. 3000 crore.
Khandey said Tourism infrastructure and government residential colonies have suffered losses to the tune of Rs 5,000 crore. “These are all preliminary estimates. A detailed assessment is presently underway,” he said.
Chief Secretary further informed that more than 550 bridges/culverts have been damaged which initially affected the road connectivity but immediate repairs were undertaken and now connectivity over most of them has been restored to a large extent. In addition, 6000 km road network were also damaged in the floods. He said 3000 WSS were affected however, most of these have been restored temporarily and drinking water is being supplied under these schemes besides other measures including RO machines have been set up to provide clean water to the people. Similarly, 3000 Power sub-stations, transmission towers, lines were also affected throughout the State, however, 90% of electricity has been restored back to normal.
He said Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has written a letter to the Union Government, requesting a special package for the rehabilitation of the flood affected people of the state. “We have requested Rs 5 lakh compensation for each fully damaged pucca house and Rs two lakh each for partially damaged pucca houses,” he said. Giving details of the damages to various sectors, the Chief Secretary said more than 3.50 lakh structures mostly residential houses have been damaged in the floods, which were the worst in the state over the past 112 years.
Director General of Police K Rajendra Kumar, who was among several officers accompanying Khandey at the media briefing, said the department had suffered losses to buildings and equipment worth Rs 350 crores. He said the police department used all its resources to help the civil administration in rescue, relief and sanitation operations in the aftermath of the floods.
In the Health sector, Secretary Health Department Gazanfar Hussain said the department had incurred loss of Rs 268 crores but the department is going to procure some equipment at a cost of Rs 8.96 crore to enable basic functioning of the affected hospitals. Secretary CAPD Baseer Khan said the department has distributed 8300 tonnes of free ration following the floods while ration will be provided free of cost to 12.5 lakh affected families for six months.
“Over 2600 tonnes of ration and 2000 tonnes of sugar were damaged at Gulab Bagh store due to floods while two trucks are reported missing in transit as they did not reach the destinations,” he said.
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