Kolkata, Sept 23: Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote another letter to PM Narendra Modi on the flood situation in West Bengal, maintaining that Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) released water from its reservoirs without consulting her government, inundating several districts.
Responding to Banerjee’s earlier letter to the PM, Union Jal Shakti Minister CR Paatil had said the state’s officials were informed at every stage about the release of water from DVC reservoirs, which was essential to prevent a major disaster.
Banerjee claimed that sometimes water is released without any notice to the state government and the views of her government are not honoured.
“Moreover peak release from the reservoirs lasting for a prolonged period of nine hours were conducted with only 3.5 hours notice which proved insufficient for effective disaster management,” she said in the letter dated September 21, which was made public on Sunday.
Banerjee said that on the night of September 16, she had requested the DVC chairman to defer the release, but it was not adhered to.
Stating that her government did not consent to the peak discharge of 2.5 lakh cusecs, she said it had requested the volume of discharge be reduced to 2.3 lakh cusecs at 4.34 pm on September 17 and 2 lakh cusecs at 5 pm.
Banerjee urged the prime minister for his personal intervention.
In her letter to Modi on September 20, she claimed that 5 million people in the state were affected by the floods.
In his response to it, Paatil had explained that the releases were managed by the Damodar Valley Reservoir Regulation Committee (DVRRC), which includes representatives from the Central Water Commission, West Bengal, Jharkhand, and the DVC.
BJP MP Samik Bhattacharya accused Banerjee of politicising the flood instead of mitigating sufferings of people.
“Due to the rampant corruption by functionaries of her own party, no central funds could be used to stop recurrence of such situations. The irrigation canals and rivers were not dredged properly, and TMC leaders sold land and filled up waterbodies. The present situation is due to the CM’s mishandling,” he claimed. (PTI)
