Weeks after tragedy, they were still trying to make up their minds: S.C. Jha
Needed: Rs.25,000 crore-Rs.30,000 crore package for rehabilitation, reconstruction
World Bank, IMF assistance sought

NEW DELHI: The Special Task Force on Bihar in the Planning Commission criticised the lack of coordination between the Centre and Bihar government in tackling the flood situation, and demanded an immediate action plan for rehabilitation of victims.

The water in his ground floor house has already covered his chairs and dining table. So Vikash Ranjan Sinha, a grocery shop owner in Madhepura, moved up to the first floor with his octogenarian parents, wife and three children, including an infant.

IN the tsunami of December 2004, people heard a strange, deep rumbling before columns of the sea came in. In 2008, the people of north Bihar had no such warning. The river was silent and swift, rising from a deceptive two feet to nearly eight feet in a matter of hours, trapping lakhs of people in remote villages in the districts of Purnea, Madhepura, Araria, Supaul, Saharsa and Kul.

Delhi School of Social Work (DSSW) has initiated a long-term relief and rehabilitation project, University for Development Action and Integrated Learning, for the flood-hit people in Bihar.

The project is expected to be on for the next six to 12 months. The project has twofold objectives

Sushanta Talukdar

Guwahati: Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil on Sunday announced Rs. 500 crore Central assistance for relief and rehabilitation of the flood-affected people of Assam. He also promised more assistance, if the State government required, for dealing with the immediate problem of food, shelter and medicines.

Mr. Patil also promised that there would not be any problem in arranging Rs. 83,000 crore required over a period of 10 to 15 years for taming the Brahmaputra and other Himalayan rivers and deal with the floods caused by these rivers.

The Union Home Minister, Shivraj Patil, today announced that the Central Government would release an amount of Rs 500 crore to Assam for relief and rehabilitation of the flood-affected people. He made the announcement after an aerial survey of the flood-affected areas of the State today.

NEW DELHI

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has asked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for a Rs 8,922 crores financial package to restructure the areas devastated by the recent floods in Bihar.

Earlier, the PM had sanctioned Rs 1,000 crores for the flood relief in the state.

Saubhadra Chatterji / New Delhi September 12, 2008, 0:36 IST

You can remove Somnath Chatterjee from the party, but you can

Sushanta Talukdar

Centre should treat Assam floods as natural calamity: AGP
Huge amount has been kept unspent

GUWAHATI: Though Assam has been allocated Rs. 210.62 crore under the Calamity Relief Fund for the year 2008-09, the Finance Ministry has not released the first instalment of the central share (Rs. 78.78 crore), due to be released in June, owing to non-submission of an utilisation report by the State government.

Atul Thakur | TNN

Saharsa: Kripanand Thakur of Forbesganj is a very worried man. His mother, 75-year-old Maya Devi, is still stuck in Pratapganj block of Supaul.

Although the distance between Forbesganj and Pratapganj is only 35 km, Kripanand took 24 hours in traversing Katihar, Khagaria and Saharsa to reach Raghavpur