Chief Secretary Nilam Sawhney on Monday informed the Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT), which is on a two-day visit to assess the extent of damage caused by the recent floods, that the State suffered an overall loss of approximately ₹6,386 crore.
At a meeting at the Secretariat, Ms. Sawhney told Saurav Ray, Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, who led the seven-member IMCT, that heavy rains and floods ravaged the State in August, September and October and the agriculture sector bore the brunt of the calamity.
However, the State government could mitigate loss to other properties and prevented a major loss of lives by taking prompt damage-control measures.
She sought a recommendation to be made to the Central government to relax the fair average quality norms to facilitate the procurement of discoloured paddy and damaged groundnut crop.
Paddy was destroyed in about 2.12 lakh hectares. The loss amounted to nearly ₹903 crore. Horticulture crops in 24,516 hectares were damaged causing a loss of ₹483 crore.
The Roads & Buildings Department incurred a loss of ₹2,976 crore on account of 5,583 kilometres of roads damaged. The Water Resources and Panchayat Raj Departments incurred a loss of ₹1,074 crore and ₹780 crore, the CS stated.
387 mandals affected
Principal Secretary (disaster management) V. Usha Rani said 3,310 villages in 387 mandals were badly affected by the torrential rains. A total of 17.74 lakh people were impacted by the calamity, which claimed 45 lives.
Special Chief Secretary (agriculture) Poonam Malakondaiah, Principal Secretary (R&B) M.T. Krishna Babu, Commissioner of Civil Supplies K. Sasidhar and other officials gave presentations on the loss incurred by the respective departments.
The IMCT comprised Ayush Punia (Ministry of Rural Development), O.P. Suman (Ministry of Power), R.B. Kaul (Ministry of Finance), K. Ponnusamy (Department of Agriculture), P. Devendar Rao (Ministry of Jal Shakti) and Shrawan Kumar (Ministry of Road Transport & Highways).
