Work on to fill breaches by Ravi in Amritsar

The work on filling the Ravi river ravine that caused large-scale flooding and disaster in the Indo-Pakistan border area, has started since Thursday. Today, MLA Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal and Deputy Commissioner Sakshi Sawhney along with officials reached the spot and reviewed the progress of the work. Additional Deputy Commissioner Rohit Gupta and SDM, Ajnala, Ravinder Singh along with senior officials of the Water Resources Department, were also present.

Dhaliwal thanked the teams and volunteers engaged in the work and said that great support has been received from the Kar Sewa sect and the local people in building the dam on the river. “This gives us hope that we will complete this work in a few days,” he said.

The Deputy Commissioner encouraged the teams and said that this would ensure that the Ravi water does not breach and flow into the villages again. XEN Gurbir Singh said that today, water level in the river receded and due to less water coming from the mountains, water from the fields also has started flowing back into the river.

“We have started the work of filling the dams at Ghonewal, Machhiwal and Kot Razada, while work is on at the remaining five places where the river breached the embankment,” he said and added that access for machinery, trucks and tractors is not yet possible at these places, so they are making a road for them to go there. As soon as it is made, work will start there too.

Additional Deputy Commissioner Rohit Gupta said that according to reports received so far, 190 villages have been affected by the flood water, affecting 1.35 lakh people. He said that five people have died due to floods in the district and two people have been injured, whose treatment is underway. So far, there are reports of damage to 134 houses and death of 18 animals, he said.