Hyderabad: Many parts of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh were facing flooding and thousands of hectares of crops were destroyed as incessant rains were continued, due to a depression in the Bay of Bengal.
The southwest monsoon had also become vigorous over both the states.
The rains have wreaked havoc in several districts of Telangana, including Nalgonda, Khammam, Warangal and Adilabad.
According to officials, Adilabad alone suffered losses of Rs1.2 billion in terms of crops and property.
Authorities in both states were on alert after the Indian Meteorological Department warned of more heavy- to very-heavy rains over the next 48 hours over north Telangana and coastal Andhra. In Telangana, Nirmal and Warangal were the worst affected as heavy rains lashed both districts over the last two days, and several low lying areas were flooded.
In Bhainsa division of Nirmal many villages were cut off as rural roads were under water.
In Warangal, district collector Amarapali said officials were closely watching the situation in the flood-prone areas after yesterday’s heavy rains.
In neighbouring Jayashankar Bhupalapally district the state highway between Eturunagaram and Burgampad was washed away partially by the overflowing river Godavari.
The river was in spate in Adilabad, Warangal and Khammam district in Telangan and East Godavari district in Andhra Pradesh.
Flood waters have entered many low-lying areas in Krishna and East Godavari districts and several villages were cut off from the outside world.
In Hyderabad, after Tuesday’s intermittent rains throwing normal life out of gear and creating massive traffic jams, the skies were overcast and officials have warned of more rains.
In a precautionary measure Telangana Tourism Development Corporation has stopped boating facility in all the reservoirs in view of rains and rising levels of water.
In Amaravati, the under construction capital of Andhra Pradesh, the roof of the newly built state secretariat building started leaking and a part of the false ceiling fell creating panic among the employees.
Water has entered the secretariat building several times during the current rainy season.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu told the media that the administration was fully geared to meet any situation and was ready to evacuate people from low lying areas.
“We have stored food grains and other essential commodities and medicines at many places in the flood prone areas for distribution in case of need,” he said.
Meanwhile, the level of water in all the major reservoirs of the state was continuing to rise while some of the medium and small irrigation tanks had developed breaches.
Prakasam barrage near Vijayawada on river Krishna was receiving 150,000 cusecs of flood water and authorities have lifted all the 70 gates up to three feet to discharge waters into the sea. 143,000 cusecs of water was flowing in to the sea, irrigation department officials said.
Tammileru reservoir in East Godavari had developed a breach last night leading to the flooding of many low lying areas.
As fresh rains were bringing more inflows from Maharashtra, the level of Sriramsagar project on Godavari river in Nizamabad had risen to 14 metres.
Water in Nagarjuna Sagar had risen by seven feet and against the full storage of 312 tmc ft the project had 200 tmcft now.
