Assam: Skies open up after a lull, 8 districts flooded

GUWAHATI: After a lull of about a week, Assam’s flood situation deteriorated in the last 24 hours following incessant rain, which has left over 8,000 people affected in eight districts of Darrang, Dhemaji, Dibrugarh, Dima Hasao, Goalpara, Kamrup (Metro) and South Salmara.
The India Meteorological Department has issued a fresh alert for heavy rain for Assam as well as neighbouring Meghalaya for Wednesday and Thursday.
According to the Assam State Disaster Management Authority, the Brahmaputra river is flowing over the danger level at Neematighat in Jorhat.
The IMD said moisture incursion was very likely to continue due to strong lower-level southerly and southwesterly winds from the Bay of Bengal to northeast India from June 14 to 18. “Widespread rainfall accompanied with thunderstorm, lightning and heavy to very heavy rainfall with extremely heavy downpour at isolated places is very likely to continue over northeastern states till June 18,” said an IMD spokesperson.
From Tuesday, the red alert will persist in Assam and Meghalaya till Thursday that has kept disaster management agencies on their toes. Artificial floods caused havoc in Guwahati since Monday night and Met officials said vast parts of lower Assam face threat of inundation.
Between 8.30 am on Monday and 8.30 am on Tuesday, Barpeta received 17 cm of rain, Beki Rd. Bridge (17 cm), Barpeta KVK AWS (16 cm), Aie N H Xing (15 cm), Bijni ARG (13 cm), Pandu (13 cm), Chandmari (12 cm) and Manikpur ARG (12 cm).