A day after Joshimath was declared a landslide-subsidence zone, authorities have intensified relief and rescue efforts in the Uttarakhand town with 68 more houses developing cracks.
According to a bulletin from the Disaster Management Authority Chamoli, a total of 82 families have been moved to safe locations in the town even as the overall number of subsidence-affected homes rose to 678.
With several residents remaining reluctant to leave their homes that have been declared unsafe, Uttarakhand Chief Secretary SS Sandhu, earlier in the day, insisted that that every minute is important and directed immediate evacuation of people from the affected zone.
The district administration had placed red cross marks on over 200 houses that are unsafe for living. It asked their occupants to either shift to the temporary relief centres or rented accommodation for which each family will get assistance of Rs 4000 per month for the next six months from the state government, news agency PTI reported.
Centre deploys NDRF personnel; 16 relief centres in place
Personnel of the National Disaster Response Force and State Disaster Response Force have been deployed for the relief and rescue efforts.
Around 16 temporary relief centres have been built for the affected people in Joshimath. In addition, 19 more hotels, guest houses and school buildings have been identified and 20 outside the town in Pipalkoti.
Sandhu held a meeting with officials at the state secretariat to review the situation and asked them to speed up the evacuation exercise. He said work on stopping toe erosion in the subsidence-hit areas should start immediately and dilapidated houses that have developed huge cracks should be razed soon so that they do not cause further damage.
He also said broken drinking water pipelines and sewer lines should also be repaired immediately as they might complicate things in the subsidence zone.
Congress demands Joshimath situation be declared national calamity
The Congress on Monday demanded that the land subsidence situation in Joshimath should be declared a national calamity and all developmental projects in the area halted till a report by experts and environmentalists is submitted on the issue.
The opposition party described it as a man-made disaster and sought enhanced compensation for each house affected due to the “unbridled development” in the area. It asked the government to preserve the old Joshimath town and develop a new town to rehabilitate the residents.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said, “Protect nature. The whole country is worried and is with the people of Joshimath, where unbridled development has created cracks in Uttarakhand’s ‘Devsthal’.” “We have three demands from the Modi government – The Joshimath tragedy should be declared a “national calamity”.
“Stop all new projects, including of railways and hydel power, until a newly appointed high-level committee of experts, scientists, environmentalists and local people submits its report,” he said in a series of tweets in Hindi.
“The oustees of Joshimath be given adequate compensation from PM CARES fund, instead of only Rs 5000,” Kharge also said.
Former chief minister Harish Rawat has also demanded that the compensation be increased to Rs 50,000 per victim and a ‘new Joshimath’ be established while preserving the old town.
PM Modi holds review meeting
A high-level review meeting was held by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) on Sunday to assess the ongoing situation, where it was decided that the immediate priority should be safety of people living in the affected area. Further, the state government should establish a clear and continuous communication channel with the residents, the PMO is learnt to have told senior state government officials.
“In the meeting, Chief Secretary of Uttarakhand Sukhbir Singh Sandhu informed the officials that state and district officials with the support of Central experts have assessed the situation on ground and found that a strip of land with a width of around 350 meters is affected. He also informed that affected families are being shifted to safe locations and the state government had also sanctioned Rs 1 crore from the CM’s Relief Fund, which would be used mainly to help provide rent for the affected families,” an official said.
The Centre has also asked experts to prepare short and long term plans for conservation and rehabilitation, given the region’s fragile ecosystem.
Meanwhile, senior Uttarakhand government officials including Chief Secretary Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, DGP Ashok Kumar and Secretary to the Chief Minister R Meenakshi Sundaram visited the worst-hit Manohar Bagh, Singdhar and Marwari areas and appealed to people to shift to temporary relief centres.
People stand next to cracked houses at the landslide affected area of Joshimath. (PTI)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi called Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami on Sunday, assuring him of all possible help for the situation in Joshimath. He also enquired about the steps being taken for rehabilitation. Dhami, in a tweet, added, “The situation in Joshimath is being analysed. We’ll also see if other mountainous towns have achieved their toleration limit.”
On Saturday (January 7), the Uttarakhand government sanctioned Rs 1 crore from the Chief Minister’s relief fund, mainly to help provide rent to the affected families. According to an official statement, the affected families will be given Rs 4,000 each as monthly rent for the next six months.
A resident affected by the gradual ‘sinking’ of the houses shifts his belongings to a safer place in Joshimath. (PTI)
NTPC’s connection to Joshimath sinking
National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has claimed that its 12.1-km-long tunnel had nothing to do with the latest instance of land subsidence in the town. This happened on January 5 (Thursday), the day work was stopped at its 4×130 MW Tapovan Vishnugad hydel project following angry protests by residents of Joshimath.
“The tunnel built by NTPC does not pass under Joshimath town. This tunnel is dug by a tunnel boring machine (TBM) and no blasting is being carried out presently,” NTPC said in a statement on Thursday. The tunnel is meant to carry river water to the plant’s turbine.
What the company did not mention is that its TBM has a history of breaches. In fact, official records accessed by The Indian Express show that since December 2009, there have been a string of “aquifer ingress” events — incidents where TBM breaks into rock that holds groundwater — along the tunnel of the Tapovan Vishnugad hydel project.
People affected by the gradual ‘sinking’ of the houses load their belongings in a truck as they move to a safer place. (PTI)
Cracks appear at houses in Joshimath in Chamoli district of Uttarakhand. (PTI)
Earth Sciences Ministry to monitor Joshimath?
The Union Earth Sciences Ministry, which has so far not been monitoring Joshimath, is likely to start monitoring the region on a regular basis. It will also augment micro-zonation of such areas and increase mapping.
A motorist navigates his way through a crack on a road in Joshimath. (AP)
The Ministry, with its different agencies monitoring seismic activity and natural disasters across the country, has so far been limited to actively monitoring earthquakes of 3.5 magnitude and above. It is likely to widen its scope to include all earthquake prone zones, including those where lesser magnitude earthquakes and tremors regularly occur.
