By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, May 6: Almost 1,000 people in at least seven districts of Meghalaya have been adversely affected by the rain, hailstones, and strong wings that continue to wreak havoc since Sunday.
Officials said 483 houses apart from schools and church buildings have been damaged. Continuous rainfall for most of Monday affected 10 more villages.
Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said he has instructed the district authorities and the departments concerned to provide relief to the affected people. “The process has started,” he said.
He said the guidelines were changed a couple of years ago, allowing the DCs to assess the damages and distribute housing materials such as CGI sheets, permitted rice, and other food items.
Revenue and Disaster Management Minister, Kyrmen Shylla said the turbulent weather damaged school buildings, churches, and other structures. “There are no reports of any casualty so far and the State Disaster Response Force has been asked to be on alert,” he said.
According to his data, nature’s onslaught has affected 400 people in Eastern West Khasi Hills, 200 in West Khasi Hills, and 159 in South West Khasi Hills district.
The minister said the government has swung into action and alerted the line departments and the deputy commissioners whenever it has received weather alerts from the India Meteorological Department (IMD).
“Rs 20 lakh is kept at the disposal of each DC to disburse to the affected people whenever such calamities occur,” he said.
Shylla said the SDMA/SEOC relays the warnings received from the IMD through the common alerting protocol (CAP)-based integrated alert system of the central government. The CAP is a system to disseminate warnings/alerts to the general public of the districts concerned via SMS through the telecom service providers (TSPs).
In CAP, all the alert-generating agencies such as the IMD, Central Water Commission, Forest Survey of India, alert authorizing agencies and alert disseminating agencies such as the TSPs are integrated to issue warnings.
Meanwhile, 30 families have been affected in three C&RD blocks of East Khasi Hills. These blocks are Mawryngkneng, Mawphlang, and Mawkynrew.
East Khasi Hills Deputy Commissioner SC Sadhu said the affected people were provided with CGI sheets within 24 hours. The administration is also providing relief to those who need relocation, he added.
“We are closely working with the MeECL to identify weak electric poles and identify landslide-prone areas as a precautionary measure,” he said.
The administration is monitoring the rainfall data to issue warnings to the people.