When the flood situation of Cuttack district continued to remain grim for the second consecutive day on Thursday, the district administration claimed that over one lakh people from over 150 villages have been affected due to floods in Mahanadi.
Among the 12 blocks affected in the district, the situations in Banki and Athagarh blocks are worse. About 50 gram panchayats of these two blocks are now facing unprecedented flood situation from where 31, 031 persons have been evacuated to safer places, said the Cuttack district Emergency Officer.
District collector Girish SN on the day visited the flood affected areas of these two blocks and supervised the rescue and relief operations. Sources said at least 34 relief centres have been opened in the district where cooked food is being provided to the evacuees.
At least six teams of NDRF, four teams of Fire brigade personnel and one team of ODRAF are now pressed into operation in the district to trace the marooned people, evacuate them to safer places and provide relief materials.
While several country boats are in operation to provide relief in places where road communication has been completely cut-off, the relief teams are also using at least 26 power boats to evacuate people stranded at far off places.
Relief materials like chuda and gurh are now provided to the affected people in Banki, Athgarh, Cuttack Sadar Mahanga blocks along with affected people of the Cuttack Municipal Corporation.
The district administration till date has sent 267 quintals of chuda to Banki, 100 quintals to Athagarh and 40 quintals each to Cuttack Sadar and Mahanga blocks.
Official sources said medical teams are also engaged in distributing halogen tablets and ORS pouches to marooned people where the drinking water facilities are completely inundated. Over 1, 04, 019 heads of cattle in the district are now being provided with cattle feed, the sources added.