Floods which ravaged Godavari districts for six days have caused a crop loss of Rs 600 crore, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu announced on Wednesday.
The CM said that the government will compensate the losses by giving Rs 25,000 per hectare to the farmers.
According to the CM, 43 villages in 19 mandals of East Godavari and 197 villages in 25 mandals of West Godavari have been affected by the floods.
Before announcing the compensation, the CM took an aerial survey of the flood-affected areas and held a review meeting with officials at Rajamahendravaram.
Addressing the media, he said that around 6,400 hectares of paddy and horticulture crops were damaged in East Godavari district alone.
Paddy crop in 11,000 hectares in the two districts were submerged and cotton in 1,300 hectares were damaged in the floods.
“Road links to 49 villages were cut off and some villages were marooned. Nearly 2,912 people were taking shelter in 16 relief camps in East Godavari,” he said.
He added that the overflowing Sabari river had severely affected the villages, TNIE reported.
According to him, the government will pay Rs 1.50 lakh each for rebuilding 250 houses that were completely damaged in the floods.
He directed officials to submit reports on the flood situation in a week’s time.
Following very high inflows into the Tammileru reservoir, authorities had to let out 80,000 cusecs of water in West Godavari district.
The CM further disclosed that he would take measures to stop the submergence problem of Erra Kalava (red canal) permanently.
"This canal caused the major damage in West Godavari district," he said, PTI reported.
Causeways damaged in the flood would be rebuilt while roads in the region would be repaired at a cost of Rs. 35 crore, he added.
Meanwhile, the Godavari continued to be in spate with the flood discharge crossing 15.24 lakh cusecs at Sir Arthur Cotton Barrage in Dowaleswaram on Wednesday.
Inflow into the Srisailam reservoir almost touched the Full Reservoir Level (FRL).
Presently, Srisailam holds 206.1 tmc ft of water at 883.3 feet as against the FRL of 215 tmc ft (885 ft), and as such, 2,12,365 cusecs was being released into the Nagarjuna Sagar dam downstream.