Monsoon rains: Chennai put on red alert

Less than a week after this metropolis was battered with rains, the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) on Tuesday issued a red alert of heavy to very heavy rainfall for Chennai and neighbouring districts on November 18.

The IMD said a low pressure area which lies over the Southeast Bay of Bengal is likely to move nearly westwards and reach west central and adjoining Southwest Bay of Bengal off south Andhra Pradesh-north Tamil Nadu coasts on November 18.

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Under its influence, IMD predicted isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall over Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Karaikal and Coastal Andhra Pradesh on Wednesday and isolated heavy to very heavy rainfall with extremely heavy falls over north Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Karaikal and south Coastal Andhra Pradesh on Thursday.

This is the second time that the city has been placed under red alert by the IMD in less than a week. On November 10 and 11, Chennai was battered with extremely heavy rainfall leading to flooding in several places across the city.

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The rains last week also affected several areas in the Cauvery delta region with thousands of hectares of crops getting affected.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister M K Stalin announced a Rs 300-crore package for repairing roads, stormwater drains, and other infrastructure that were damaged during the recent rains. He also announced a compensation of Rs 20,000 per hectare towards damage to crops that were ready for harvest and Rs 6,038 per hectare to farmers to enable them to replant their damaged crops.

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