PESHAWAR, Sept 11: The federal government has approved Rs2.75 billion against NWFP’s demand of Rs22 billion for a flood management plan, sources said. Senior officials said the amount was not sufficient for preparing an affective plan, which included restoration of infrastructure, construction of new structure and feasibility study of water storages in upper parts of the province.

They said that on directives of the prime minister, the NWFP irrigation department prepared a comprehensive flood management plan.

“The provincial government had sought Rs22 billion for the 10-year programme, but the centre sanctioned only Rs2.75 billion,” an official told Dawn.

He said the plan included repairing existing infrastructure, building new structure along river banks, feasibility studies of 14 storages on various rivers, installation of telemetry system, and a high-tech flood forecasting and warning centre in the province.

“Being upper riparian, the province needs a flood warning and telemetry system, including electronic gauges, to timely inform people about floods and properly monitor the flow of water in rivers,” said an engineer.

Despite that major rivers and streams originated from the NWFP, with four rivers – Kabul, Kaitu, Touchi and Kurram – entering from Afghanistan, the NWFP does not have a flood forecasting and warning system.

The hydrology division in the provincial irrigation department has only telephone and fax facility through which data about flood situation is received and then disseminated to people.

A telemetry system installed by the Water and Power Development Authority in the irrigation department had been out of order for four years, sources said. Such a system installed in Balochistan also did not function, they said.

At present, officials said, the irrigation department had no monitoring system and it relied on Wapda and the Indus River System Authority to obtain data about water level in rivers. The province needs to install modern gauges on rivers coming from its upper parts and Afghanistan. Recently, the department concerned had called upon the federal government to install modern gauges on rivers.

Officials said gauges installed at various locations on rivers were outdated and did not provide accurate data to the warning centre about the flood level.

“The problem is very serious in hilly and remote areas of the province where people do not receive warning about flash flood because the department does not have any system or mechanism to issue early warning,” said a flood expert.

He said mosques and local police stations were the only sources to warn people about floods, but on many occasions it was too late to evacuate people from dangerous zones. Gauges installed at Aman Dara and Munda headworks on the Swat river did not provide correct data.

In the NWFP, hill torrents, in addition to floods, also cause damages. Recent floods wrecked havoc in 12 districts of the province.

NWFP relief commissioner Fazl Rabi said floods had killed 230 people and damaged over 32,000 houses, and the damages amounted to Rs2.50 billion.

Officials said the province did not have accurate data about the magnitude of water flowing out of the NWFP. For this purpose, they proposed, the government should install apparatus at certain points on the river Kunhar, Dera-i-Tang and Gambella.

Water experts say that apart from installing a modern warning system, the government should formulate an affective flood management plan to minimise damages and control wastage of water.

Quoting an Irsa report, an official said about 18 million acre feet (MAF) water had gone waste during the current flood season. Therefore, he said, the government should construct reservoirs, protection walls and embankments along rivers.

“You can’t avert a threat 100 per cent, however the damages can be minimised through an affective flood management and response plan,” said an engineer.

He said construction of reservoirs in upper parts of the province would reduce flood threats and could improve irrigation system.