Centre gave advance warning to Kerala on July 23, says Amit Shah on Wayanad landslide
New Delhi, Jul 31: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Wednesday said the Kerala government was warned as early as July 23 regarding a possible natural calamity in Wayanad due to heavy rains and nine NDRF teams were rushed to the state the same day.
However, the Kerala government did not heed to the early warning and also did not get alerted even by arrival of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) battalions, Shah said in the Rajya Sabha.
Shah assured the House that the Narendra Modi government was standing a like a "rock" with the Kerala government and people of the state in this moment of the tragedy. He also promised all help from the central government.
Intervening in the short duration calling attention motion on the Wayanad landslide tragedy in the Upper House, Shah also assured help and support of the Centre to the state and the people to deal with the situation.
He criticised the opposition for questioning the central government's early warning systems, and its response to the tragedy.
Shah said early warning was sent to the state seven days ahead of the July 30 landslide. Another warning was given on July 24 also.
"Nine NDRF battalions were dispatched on July 23 itself and three more were sent on July 30," Shah said.
He further said several states, including Odisha and Gujarat used the early warnings provided by the Centre to reduce impact of natural calamities like cyclone.
Had the Kerala government got itself alerted and acted as soon as NDRF teams landed there, losses could have been minimised, the Home Minister said.
Replying to the calling attention motion, Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai informed the House that 133 bodies have been recovered so far and death toll may rise.
#WATCH | Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah says, "... Under this early warning system, on July 23, at my direction, 9 NDRF teams were sent to Kerala considering that there could be landslides... What did the Kerala government do? Were the people shifted? And if they were… pic.twitter.com/P29bTb2buk
— ANI (@ANI) July 31, 2024
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
