Montha: AP Estimates Loss at Rs 6,384 Crore

Vijayawada: The Andhra Pradesh government has estimated the total loss due to the cyclonic storm Montha to be Rs 6,384 crore and sought immediate interim relief of Rs 901.4 crore from the Centre.

Special chief secretary (revenue) G. Jayalakshmi and state disaster management authority managing director Prakhar Jain gave a presentation to the eight-member Central team at the state Secretariat on Monday.

The Central team was headed by Home Affairs Joint Secretary Pasumibasu and Agriculture and farmers’ welfare director K. Ponnuswamy.

The senior officials informed the Central team that the cyclonic storm caused widespread destruction in 24 districts.

In the agriculture sector, crops like paddy, cotton, green gram, maize and others spread over 1.61 lakh acres suffered damage. Horticulture crops in 6,250 hectares and mulberry plantations in 17.72 hectares were affected.

In the fisheries sector, fish ponds in 3,063 hectares were destroyed.

Montha also damaged 4,566 houses and 1,833 schools.

The roads and buildings department registered damage to roads in 4,794 km and to 311 bridges and culverts. The water resources department recorded damage to 3,437 minor and 2,417 major and medium irrigation structures.

In addition to these, 58 urban local bodies reported heavy damage due to the rain.

The state officials sought immediate Central assistance to take up rehabilitation and reconstruction works and for extending help to the affected farmers.

The officials explained how the advance planning by the state government helped to avert loss of human lives and how the relief operations were taken up on a war footing in the affected areas.

Based on the past experiences in cyclonic storms and floods, the AP government leveraged technology to enhance response mechanisms. Some 680 robes were deployed in real time for monitoring of the flood situation and to take up search and rescue operations in coordination, in addition to taking up assessment of the damage, the state officials said.

This was one of the largest deployments for rescue and relief in the country, they stated.

From October 27 to October 29, AP recorded 82.3mm of rainfall, which is nine times higher than the normal average rainfall. Montha affected 443 mandals, caused three deaths, submerged 9,960 houses and displaced 1,11,402 persons.

Moreover, the government deployed 12 NDRF and 13 SDRF teams, 1,702 vehicles and 110 trained swimmers. A total of 2,471 rehabilitation centres were set up in 22 districts providing shelter to 1,92,441 displaced persons, the central team was told.