Musi Floods 2022: Low-lying areas were not alerted before opening the dam gates

Hyderabad: Hanima B, 55 years is on the second floor of her apartment near the Chaderghat bridge. The ground floor and first floor of her apartment are submerged in water. Hanima says, "I have lived on the banks of the river all my life. Earlier when the river overflowed, we were shifted to school. But then we built a two-storeyed structure hoping that the situation will be different. It is still getting flooded. We are 15 members in the house and are not going anywhere. There is no current right now. We will wait for the waters to recede."

The others in the locality near Chaderghat bridge have all left. There are more than 500 families which left at around 11 pm on the night of 26 July as the water levels rose. "We just walked out of our homes. No clothes, belongings, nothing has been taken. It will all be in water now. The water has submerged our homes once again," says 23-year-old Heena who is at her relative's home in Malakpet.

Heavy flow in Osman Sagar, Himayat Sagar

The water level in the Musi river has been increasing in the last 24 hours because of the incessant rains and the opening of the gates of Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar reservoirs. The water from both these reservoirs are being let out to the Musi river. The Moosarambagh bridge got completely submerged and water was observed flowing over the bridge on the morning of 27 July. Water entered into houses in nearby areas like Chaderghat, Shankar Nagar Kamal Nagar, Moosa Nagar.

So far, 13 gates of Osman Sagar reservoir have been opened up to 6 feet height and 8 gates of Himayat Sagar reservoir have been opened up to 3 feet height. According to HMWSSB's data at 4 pm on Wednesday, the present water level at Osman Sagar is 1788.80 feet with an inflow of 7500 cusecs and outflow of 8281 cusecs. In Himayat Sagar, currently the water flow is 1761.30 with an inflow of 7000 cusecs and outflow of 7708 cusecs.

Vijayalakshmi Gadwal, the GHMC Mayor said that they have evacuated around 1500 people living nearby Musi river.

Gates were opened before reaching FTL

Environmentalist and water expert B V Subba Rao said that the gates were opened before the water in the reservoirs reached the Full Tank Level (FTL). "20- 25 days back, when they said two of the gates have been lifted I had gone there to see it personally but they did not let me in. Why is there so much secrecy about the whole thing ? A lot of development came right under the nose of the reservoirs although we do not know how their constructions were permissible," he said. He further said that the release of the water from the reservoirs before required was mainly aimed at protecting these illegal buildings.

Rao also said that the government had not given any communication in advance to the people living in the low-lying areas downstream regarding the rising water level in Musi in the last two days. The state did not take any precautionary measures, he alleged.

Another issue that he pointed out was the lack of demarcation of the floodplains (low-lying areas adjacent to a river, subject to flooding). "Flood plain areas should ideally not have any buildings. But the government has not taken any attempts to demarcate the flood plains. Every river has a course that it takes. Even if it does not rain in a year, there should not be any encroachment. The rules should be strictly followed," added Subba Rao.