Rajya Sabha’s Committee on Petitions has recommended that the country’s entire flood forecasting network and its overall efficacy should be evaluated by an independent, third party expert. The Committee also recommended building of more flood forecasting stations, especially in States and adoption of latest technology being used in other countries to forecast floods accurately.
The Committee, headed by Prasanna Acharya, tabled its report in the Upper House, on the petition moved by Prof Raj Kachroo, a resident of Gurugram, Haryana ‘praying for development of capacity to make real time forecasting of floods so as to issue timely warning to the affected people’. The panel recommended both the Centre and the State government to bring an immediate end to illegal construction activities and vegetation on flood plains across the country.
The Committee has asked the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology to encourage C-DAC to specifically develop supercomputer for flood forecasting system and implement 2D/3D distributed model on a very fine resolution grid for better prediction thereby increasing data size.
The Committee further recommends that the latest forecasting techniques presently being used by the other countries are required to be studied and a suitable method required to be adopted for purpose of the forecast
The petition highlights the issues of negligence and inattention on parts of the Ministry of Jal Shakti (erstwhile Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation) and Ministry of Science and Technology in developing capacity for real time forecasting of floods and management of reservoirs, lack of any significant effort made by the Central Water Commission (CWC) in developing real time flood forecasting, exigency of developing the required expertise and capacity at home by roping in Universities across the country, and necessity of having legislation on Dam Safety.
Calling for evaluation of the entire flood forecasting network, the Committee recommended resolving the shortcomings.
