Anantnag, Jul 13: The cloudburst and subsequent flash floods that struck south Kashmir’s Anantnag district on the night of July 11 have damaged 79 water supply schemes across four sub-divisions of the Jal Shakti Department, with restoration work underway and tanker services pressed into use in the worst-affected areas, officials said.
Executive Engineer, Jal Shakti Division Anantnag, Sareer Ahmad, told Rising Kashmir that the cloudburst and flash floods had damaged the Jal Shakti network across four sub-divisions of the district.
He said the worst-hit sub-division was Bijbehara, where 45 water supply schemes were affected. Of these, 38 schemes developed turbidity issues, while four schemes catering to Anantnag town, Bijbehara town, Mattan town and Achabal town were also hit. He said the four town-level schemes have since been restored.
Of the 38 schemes affected by turbidity, 30 have been restored so far, Ahmad said. He said the pipe network remains disturbed in the remaining schemes, and that damage assessment and pipeline retrieval work is underway. Tanker services have been arranged to supply drinking water in the affected areas until the water level recedes and the network is fully restored, he said.
Ahmad said the Pahalgam side saw comparatively less damage, with only around five schemes affected. He said two separate cloudbursts had struck the district that night, one in Chittergul and the other in Pahalgam, and that most of the affected schemes were on the Chittergul side. Restoration work is underway there as well, he said.
Separately, Assistant Executive Engineer (AEE), Anantnag sub-division, Gowhar Hussain, said 31 of the 75 water supply schemes in the sub-division were affected by the cloudburst and flash floods. Of these, nine schemes developed turbidity issues while 23 suffered physical damage, he said. Sixteen of the affected schemes have been made operational so far, with restoration work continuing on the rest, Hussain said.
