Villagers blame builders for shoddy work as heavy rain in Himachal floods houses, bridges
Shimla, June 23
Villagers in Bilaspur’s Ghumarwin and Hamirpur’s Tauni Devi blamed construction companies for poor planning as heavy rain in these areas on Friday flooded houses and submerged roads and bridges, disrupting normal life.
As heavy rain battered Daghol village in the Ghumarwin area of Bilaspur district, a newly built bridge in the area got submerged, leading to long queues of vehicles on both sides. A portion of a road got flooded due to strong water currents. Water from a swollen canal swept away a car, which was later found near the flooded bridge.
Agitated villagers of Daghol squatted on the road to voice their resentment against the construction company, which they alleged constructed the new bridge without completely dismantling the old bridge.
Traffic in the area resumed only after the police reached the spot and pacified the protestors.
Meanwhile, gushing water entered some houses in Thana Dorgan village in the Tauni Devi area of Hamirpur district on Friday, damaging household goods and electronic gadgets.
The affected people blamed the construction company executing the Mandi-Hamirpur National Highway project. They alleged that the company started constructing a new bridge on the highway without channelising a 2 km canal, therefore changing the course of water and forcing it to enter the houses.
Tehsildar Ashish Sharma spoke to the affected people and began relief operations. He also directed the site engineer concerned to ensure proper channelisation of the canal water at the earliest.
Sushil Kumar, the site engineer of the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI), said instructions were issued to the company to complete the work six months ago.
Apart from Bilaspur and Hamirpur, the Kangra and Mandi districts also witnessed heavy downpours.
According to weather data recorded in the past 24 hours, Bhoranj in Hamirpur was the wettest with 122 mm of rainfall, followed by Ghaghas and Mehre recording 108 mm and 95 mm of rainfall.
Baldwara recorded 92 mm of rainfall, Panjgain 88 mm, Gaggal 67 mm, Slapper 66 mm and Kahu 50 mm, the weather bulletin showed.
Heavy pre-monsoon rain is an indication of the arrival of monsoon, which is likely to hit the state by June end, said Local MeT Director Surender Paul.
The local meteorological centre has issued a yellow alert of heavy rainfall, thunderstorm and lightning at isolated places over plains, low and mid hills on June 23, 24 and 27.
It has also issued an orange warning at isolated places on June 25 and 26. Heavy to very heavy rainfall, thunderstorm and lightning is predicted over plains, low and mid hills on these two days, while the higher reaches of the state are likely to receive snowfall.
While the low-lying areas were lashed with heavy rain on Friday, the mercury dropped marginally but stayed above normal in the tribal areas lying in the higher reaches. Reckongpeo and Kalpa in Kinnaur district recorded a high of 31.5 degrees Celsius and 25.4 degrees Celsius, while the mercury stood at 30.8 degrees Celsius and 27 degrees Celsius in Kusumseri and Keylong respectively, which was higher than many places in lower and mid-hills.
