By Matters India Reporter
Hyderabad: Civil society has come out in large numbers to help people affected by floods in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad.
“The rains have caused massive devastation and great suffering to the people in Hyderabad,” says Father Varghese Theckanath, director of the Montfort Social Institute engaged in rescue and relief works.
They volunteers are engaged in rescue, with food and other support systems. Some activists have set up a civil society flood advocacy group to coordinate help.
They organized press conference October 16 at Press Club Somajiguda to share details about relief Initiatives by civil society organizations. They also discussed the support required by the flood affected people. The conference also studied why Hyderabad has become so vulnerable to regular flooding and the concrete steps needed to avoid it in future.
One of the worst affected areas is Indra nagar, a slum area, where many people were marooned for three days. “Almost all their belongings were washed away in the floods,” said Sister Lissy Joseph of the Telangana State Domestic Workers Union.
She said their office too was submerged in the water and “all things, furniture, documents, computer were all lost.”
Under water also was the ground floor of Jeevan Jyothi complex under of Women’s Section of the Conference of Religious India.
The civil society team rescued two families from a colony with great difficulty. Some workers of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation came with tractor took out nine people.
Meanwhile, schools and colleges buildings were turned to shelter homes for those affected by the rains and floods.
The local unit of the Conference of Religious India has decided to help flood affected people in Hyderabad. But they have decided not to accept cash or checks for the relief services but help in kind.
It plans to reach out at least 1,000 families with food kits containing rice, cooking oil, pulses and chilli powder. They also distributed one blank for each of the 1,000 families. They also provide cooking utensils, and sleeping mats,
Montfort Brother Raja Durai, who heads the insertion community, People’s Initiative Network (PIN) located in Moosanagar slum on the banks of River Moosi, one of the most affected areas, opened up the building to the flood affected neighbors. The ground floor of the building was under water.
Montfort Social Institute, a core committee member in the civil society group, coordinates rescue, and relief operations. The institute has started a survey in most affected slums to assess damage and to study support required.
Heavy rains have plunged Hyderabad into darkness, as several areas had no electricity for days.
Several residents October 15 took to Twitter to complain about the lack of response from ground officials. The city
However, people also complained about the lack of broadband internet connectivity. Uprooted trees and electricity poles, fallen branches, and waterlogging were cited as the reason by officials.
The official Twitter handle of Telangana State Southern Power Distribution Company Limited (@TsspdclCorporat) was flooded with tweets registering complaints and a lack of response on the ground. Many pointed out that rains have subsided and questioned the delay in restoring the power supply.
The Indian Meteorological Department noted that the deluge on October 13 was Hyderabad’s highest rainfall in October since 1891.
The rains were triggered by a deep depression in the Bay of Bengal that hit the Andhra Pradesh coast and moved towards Telangana while weakening into a depression.
Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao October 15 held an emergency high-level meeting to review the situation in the state post heavy rains and floods.