Permanent solution to floods urged

CPI (M) State secretary Tammineni Veerabhadram has demanded that the government find a permanent solution to the recurring problem of flooding of low-lying areas along the course of the Godavari in Bhadrachalam town and its adjoining areas.

Mr Veerabhadram on Sunday visited the flood-affected Kotha Colony and Ashoknagar in Bhadrachalam, where the swollen Godavari receded gradually below the first flood warning level of 43 feet later in the day.

CPI (M) leader Midiam Babu Rao and party State secretariat member P Sudarshan Rao, district secretary A Kanakaiah, and town secretary G Swamy accompanied him.

Later, talking to reporters in the temple town, Mr Veerabhadram said there was an urgent need to initiate concrete measures to prevent flood risk and mitigate the hardships being faced by people living in low-lying areas in the temple town.

The water level in the Godavari at Bhadrachalam was expected to remain at the danger mark of 53 feet constantly after the completion of the Polavaram multipurpose irrigation project under construction in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, he said.

Successive governments in the past had not heeded the suggestions to reduce the height of the Polavaram dam to minimise submergence, he said, demanding a long-term solution to the recurring problem of flooding in the riverside habitations in Bhadrachalam Agency.

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