Ooty: Rains begin to play havoc with roads, crops and power supply

Ooty: The Southwest monsoon rains that turned vigorous in central and western Nilgiris since Wednesday evening saw incessant rains in Ooty town and other parts of the Nilgiris since Thursday morning.

The pouring rains across the hills caused minor landslips in about 20 places between Ithalar and Emerald and in about dozen places in the Ooty-Gudalur sector. There are reports of minor landslips and uprooting of trees along the Ooty-Kundah road. This is keeping disaster management teams on their toes to clear the mess, pave the way for traffic to move and restore electricity. The task is really challenging between the Sandhinallah-Naduvattam-Gudalur stretch along the Ooty-Mysuru NH as minor landslips in about a dozen places in this stretch played havoc with traffic on Thursday. While the rains have wrecked the hopes of the tourism industry which hoped for good business from this Friday due to the lengthy holidays next week due to Bakrid and Independence day, the flooding of low-lying areas has begun in settlements in the Muthorai Palada area and submerged vegetable fields in and around Nanjanad village limits and other places.

The district administration is monitoring the situation and disaster management teams are placed at the taluk level to respond to any situation that may arise due to rains.