Maha govt urges RBI, SBI to make ATMs operations normal

As flood-battered Sangli and Kolhapur struggle to come back to normalcy, the Maharashtra government has urged the RBI and largest public sector bank SBI to make ATMs operations functional.

More than five lakh people have been displaced in the worst-ever floods that Maharashtra has seen in recent times.

Large quantity of medicines to prevent the spread of water-borne diseases, chlorine tablets for water purification, DDT and bleaching for cleaning has been sent to Sangli and Kolhapur, the worst-affected areas and other districts.

Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis chaired a high-level meeting on Sunday evening to review the situation.

As of now, 105 teams are engaged in relief operations including Army, Navy, Air Force, NDRF, SDRF besides district and municipal administration and local self-government bodies.
In the two districts, 761 villages were affected.

Over 200 roads and 90 bridges still remained closed, reports reaching here said.

Nearly 35 people have lost their lives in the floods triggered by unusual and unprecedented heavy rainfall in Western Maharashtra and Konkan regions.

Fadnavis had spoken to prime minister Narendra Modi and is regularly in touch with home minister Amit Shah, defence minister Rajnath Singh, railway minister Piyush Goyal and petroleum and natural gas minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

After the next weekly Cabinet meeting, the Maharashtra government may seek a relief package from the Centre to tide over the crisis.

"Make available required machinery at all places to clean the flood-affected areas and coordinate efforts of government and NGOs for the post flood relief," Fadnavis said.

Half a dozen ministers including revenue minister Chandrakant Patil, water resources and medical education minister Girish Mahajan, health minister Eknath Shinde and cooperation minister Subhash Deshmukh are camping in flood-affected areas.