Water level in Tangri river recedes, some Ambala areas still inundated

The water level in the Tangri river receded from residential colonies on Friday, much to the relief of residents. After touching the maximum level of over 43,000 cusecs on Wednesday night, about 10,560 cusecs of water was flowing in the river on Friday.

While water had receded from several colonies, including Aman Nagar, Lucky Nagar and Prabhu Prem Puram, leaving the streets and houses full of mud and sludge, Sonia Colony, Vikas Puri and Industrial Area continued to witness severe waterlogging.

Mahindro Devi, a resident of Aman Nagar, said, “For the second time in a week, Tangri hit our colony and there was nearly 4-5 ft water in my house. While we shifted electronic goods to safer places, the furniture was still in the house. We have been living here for last 35 years and do labour work to earn our livelihood. We are in no position to shift to any other place.”

Ashok Kumar, another resident, said, “The water is receding gradually and it will take a couple of days for us to clean the house completely as large quantity of mud has accumulated. We hope that there are no more flood alerts for Tangri as we have already suffered a lot over the last 10 days.”

Meanwhile, owners of factories at Industrial Area were not able to go inside respective units, as there was still 6-8 ft water in the area.

Inder Kumar, purchase manager in a factory, said, “The situation is very bad and all sophisticated and costly machines are under water. Similar situation was witnessed in 2023. We afraid that the Industrial Area may not survive if the government fails to make efforts to check flooding. It may take nearly a month for the factory to resume routine operations.”

Sandeep Mangla, who works as a supervisor in a unit, said, “There is nearly 6-ft water inside the factory and we have suffered a heavy loss. It may take two to three days to drain out the water completely. There is not much help as well.”

Kapil Verma, owner of a scientific apparatus manufacturing unit, said, “The situation is very bad. We have faced a similar situation two years back when the Tangri had flooded Industrial Area. Despite our efforts and requests to the government to get Industrial Area protected from floods, we are again watching our units going under water. We are still recovering from previous losses. The flood has dealt another blow to the factory owners. There are 130 units and the loss may run up to over Rs 300-400 crore. We didn’t get much time to even cover the machines and vehicles.”

Vikas Jindal, who owns a furniture showroom, said, “No efforts are being made by the authorities to save industrial units from floods. People have suffered losses worth crores, but there is not much help. We have not been compensated by insurance companies.”

Ambala Deputy Commissioner Ajay Singh Tomer said, “Water in the Tangri has receded. Work to drain out water from the colonies is underway. Some areas, including Vikas Puri, Sonia Colony and Industrial Area, are still witnessing waterlogging. Arrangements are being made to drain out water with the help of pump sets.”