SHILLONG, July 19 ? With incessant rains, the flood situation in Meghalaya?s Garo Hills has turned grim on Sunday, affecting 80,000 people in 100 villages. The West Garo Hills district Deputy Commissioner S Jagannathan told PTI over phone that a high-level official team met at Tura to review the situation and a ?preliminary report? would be submitted to the Chief Minister tomorrow. Jagannathan said as per the report, Rs. 15 lakh was needed for distribution of relief like rice, dal and salt, Rs. 10 lakh for medicine for the affected people, Rs. 20 lakh for veterinary medicine, Rs. 24 lakh for safe drinking water immediately to tackle the situtation.
Besides, the administration also needed Rs. 64 lakh for post-flood rehabilitation in agriculture. Earlier, a high-powered official team comprising commissioners of divisions for Garo Hills, agriculture commissioner and senior officers from the Health and Family Welfare and Animal Husbandry departments made an on the spot assessment of the situation. State?s Public Works Minister Mukul Sangma would tour the affected areas soon.
Landslides:Landslides trigerred by heavy rain have disrupted road communications on NH 44 at Sonapur area of Meghalaya cutting off Tripura, Mizoram and parts of Assam and Manipur from the rest of the country. According to Border Roads Organisation (Project Setuk) sources, although clearing of debris was on, heavy rain was hampering repair work at Sonapur, a landslide-prone area in Jaintia Hills district, 142 km from here. As a result of this, heavy and light vehicles meant for Tripura, Mizoram, parts of Assam (Cachar and Karimganj) and Western Manipur were stranded at differnt places of Jaintia Hills district, the sources said.