Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Tuesday cancelled all his engagements in Pune district and said he would go to the Marathwada area of the state, which has been severely affected by rain and floods
AS MARATHWADA battles an “unprecedented” flood situation, the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) has asked the state government to ensure quick relief to the affected villagers while the Fadnavis government said it was making all efforts to provide assistance to all the affected villages. However, one of his ministers came under fire from aggrieved villagers after he purportedly told them that “he had not come to them with money”.
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During his tour of the flood-affected Dharashiv district on Tuesday, the cavalcade of Water Resources Minister Girish Mahajan was stopped by villagers at Chinchpur village in Bhoom taluka where hundreds of livestock have been washed away in the surging floodwaters besides damaging standing crop and displacing the villagers.
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As soon as they spotted the minister’s car, the villagers blocked its way. They complained to him about their plight and how no assistance has reached them. In response, the minister purportedly said, “I will tell the administration to help you out. I have not come here with money.” As commotion prevailed, the minister instead of going to other villages headed for Barshi in neighbouring district.
Later, speaking to reporters, the minister said, “This issue relates to the state cabinet. Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and two deputy chief ministers will decide about it. The rain that Marathwada witnessed is unprecedented. We have never witnessed anything like this before. The damage is huge. Crop has been lost, livestock washed away, people have been displaced… I am in touch with the chief minister for past two-three days. I have discussed everything with the chief minister. We will take decisions as per the situation prevailing in a particular area. We are firmly with the affected farmers and villagers.. The government will take decision regarding declaration of ‘wet drought’. Yesterday I was in Beed and Jalgaon. Today I am in Dharashiv. And I would be heading for Solapur,” he said.
As it emerged the situation has worsened in several districts, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Tuesday cancelled all his engagements in Pune district and said he would go to the Marathwada area of the state, which has been severely affected by rain and floods.
Pawar said his Jan Sanvad programme, scheduled for September 24 in Khadakwasla, and the Rashtravadi Parivar Milan programme on September 25 have been deferred. “Due to the heavy rain in many districts of Maharashtra, farmers and citizens have suffered extensive damage. In some places, this flood situation has led to the tragic loss of lives. At the same time, there has been significant damage to numerous homes, household items, and livestock,” he said.
“I will visit the flood-affected areas. Additionally, I have issued instructions to all guardian ministers of the NCP to visit the farmers’ settlements and villages in the districts assigned to them. And MLAs should do the same in their constituencies, to provide immediate relief and assistance to the affected citizens; furthermore, the administration should promptly begin conducting panchnamas,” he added.
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Opposition parties, including the NCP (SP) and Shiv Sena (UBT), lashed out at the government, accusing it of not paying attention to Marathwada.
Speaking to reporters in Pune, NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar urged the state government to conduct an early “panchanama” of the crop loss. “The government should take immediate steps to assist the farmers. Besides Marathwada, Western Maharashtra and Vidarbha have also been hit by floods. Crops on several acres of land have been damaged. The farmers have suffered huge losses due to the excess rainfall,” he said.
“Maharashtra has witnessed unprecedented rain. It has affected farmers and livestock. Those districts known for drought have experienced excess rain. The soybean crop, on which farmers rely heavily, has also suffered significant damage, putting them in trouble. I don’t remember such rain occurring in the past,” Pawar said, adding only “panchanama” won’t suffice, the government should extend help for the entire crop loss.
Shiv Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sanjay Raut said the flood situation in Marathwada has become grim. “Instead of being busy in politics and attending to political events, Fadnavis should pay attention to the flood situation in Marathwada and help the affected villagers,” Raut said.
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NCP state president Sunil Tatkare said, “Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar has given instructions to officials to make all efforts to rescue the people and reach out to them with all necessary help. From tomorrow morning, Ajit Pawar will visit all the affected districts.”
Beed MLA Sandeep Kshirsagar said, “In entire Beed district, the overflowing rivers and nullahs have badly affected the standing crop and houses. The district has witnessed cloudbursts. In last 40-50 years, we have never witnessed this kind of rain.”
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More
