100 villages on River Krishna basin to get flood alerts

Learning from the 2019 disaster when floods and landslide cost 91 lives and caused a total loss of over Rs 35,000 crore, the disaster management officials have begun work to build a state-of-the-art public broadcasting system in 100 villages of 13 districts in Krishna basin.

The Karnataka State Natural Disaster Management Center (KSNDMC) has designed a multi-tier system where communication can be relayed directly from state, district or taluk headquarter to all the vulnerable gram panchayats.

"Besides the local expertise, the system will have direct connections with scientific institutions such as Indian Space Research Organisation and several networks monitoring seismic, weather and other phenomena. The focus will be on reducing the time consumed at several stages, from identifying the problem to the relaying it to the last receiver," a senior official from the KSNDMC said.

The loudspeakers will come to life not only for floods but also to provide information on extreme weather like heatwave, heavy rains and weather phenomena that has a direct consequence on agrarian life.

"This continuous engagement will not only ensure that the system is in working condition, but also helps in developing a communication channel with the public," he said.

The system will provide three types of messages. First, public awareness messages with a precautionary note based on the information gathered through scientific monitoring networks; secondly, warning about ongoing events once the disaster sets in at an area and lastly, follow up on the events by providing advisories keep in mind long-term impacts of disasters.

The 100 "severe flood-vulnerable" gram panchayats are spread across Belagavi, Raichur, Ballari, Koppal, Kalaburagi, Bagalkot, Vijayapura, Gadag, Haveri, Dharwad, Shivamogga, Uttara Kannada and Yadgir.

Officials plan to set up the new system in Raichur, Belagavi and Vijayapura in the first phase within the next three months at a cost of Rs 1 crore.

"These districts need immediate attention. Once the central system is in place, all we need to scale up the system are simple devices like transmitters, loudspeakers and amplifiers," the official said.