the goan I network
BELAGAVI
Torrential rains lashing south Maharashtra and north Karnataka region for several days has not only led to floods in the region, but for the first ever time, incessant rains have left city of Belagavi marooned.
With water all around, the city was totally abandoned as road and rail traffic from all directions came to a grinding halt.
Areas in and around Belagavi continued receiving heavy rains throughout Monday night. Rains continued to lash throughout Tuesday due to which rivulets and nullahs, including river Markandey, near Belagavi city were in spate.
This left all the approach roads, including the Goa-Belagavi NH4A and Belagavi-Vengurla Road inundated, forcing the police to block the traffic entering the city.
Commissioner of Police B S Lokeshkumar appealed to citizens not to leave their houses unless for an emergency. Even otherwise, with majority of the areas in the city underwater, the city took a deserted look. Majority of the low-lying areas including Shivajinagar, Shashtrinagar and Nanawadi were inundated as water entered the houses and shops in the localities.
As the heavy rains kept lashing, flood waters started spreading all over the place. By 10 am, the Belagavi-Pune NH4A was submerged near Indal factory, Belagavi-Vengurla Road was submerged near Uchgaon and the Belagavi-Goa NH4A was submerged near Peeranwadi due to which vehicular movement came to a grinding halt.
Also, the new bridge near Khanapur on the Belagavi-Goa Road was submerged for the first time.
Meanwhile, owing to torrential rains and flooding of rivers, 76 villages in Belagavi district have been completely left marooned. Thousands of people caught in the floods in 50 villages were evacuated on Tuesday. Inflow in Krishna river flooded all along its banks reached 5 lakh cusec by Tuesday evening.
Hundreds of rescue personnel from NDRF, SDRF, fire stations, police department had a harrowing time risking their lives to evacuate people from some of the worst-hit areas on banks of Krishna on Tuesday.
In a dare-devil operation, a team of fire personnel evacuated 15 people caught in flash floods near Teerth, Athani taluka on Tuesday evening.
According to rescuers, the 15 would have been washed away if the team had not reached in time to pull them out from the jaws of death.
According to Assistant Commissioner of Chikkodi, Ravindra Karaninganavar, about 16,000 families and 12,000 cattle have been shifted to safety by various teams involved in the rescue operation in the flood-hit areas of Chikkodi and Athani talukas.
