30,000 acres submerged; Army roped in for plugging breaches in Phillaur, Shahkot

Tribune News Service
Lohian (Jalandhar), August 20

The Jalandhar district administration has sought the help of Army for plugging in the breaches as nearly 30,000 acres have been submerged in water in more than 50 villages, officials said on Tuesday.

Deputy Commissioner, Jalandhar, Varinder Kumar Sharma and Senior Superintendent of Police Navjot Singh Mahal said the district administration has sought the help of the Army for plugging in the breaches.

In a joint statement, the DC and the SSP said the Army has been called in to expedite the work of plugging the breaches at village Mandiala and Jania in Shahkot sub division adding that one column of Army has reached Phillaur and one has reached Lohian for help.

They said another column of Army would reach Shahkot tomorrow for plugging the breach adding that the requisite support would be given to the Army by the district administration.

They said that every effort would be made to ensure that the life and property of the people was safeguarded at every cost.

The DC said despite repeated efforts by district administration some people have not evacuated their homes due to which people were stranded in various villages.

They said ten teams of Indian Army, National Disaster Response Force and State Disaster Response Force have been pressed in to evacuate the people.

Similarly they said the teams of the revenue and police officials have been constituted to provide food and help to the stranded people.

They further said that in order to ensure relief to people, the help of Indian Air Force has been taken to airdrop food packets to the needy.

They said Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh was personally supervising the entire operations to make sure that people do not face any problem.

They said that work of airdropping food packets would start early tomorrow morning to ensure relief to the people. Meanwhile, they appealed to the people to exercise restrain as this was a natural catastrophe.