The State government has declared a three-day holiday for all educational institutions, right from schools to universities, in view of widespread, incessant rains.
The holidays from July 11 to 13 will apply to technical as well as non-technical courses, Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao told a media conference after a review meeting to discuss the rain situation in the State.
He said Telangana was likely to get heavy to very heavy rains for four to five days under the impact of a cyclonic storm from south Odisha to Chhattisgarh which was likely to intensify further. All the reservoirs and tanks were getting filled due to heavy inflows. The outflow at Sammakka barrage in Eturunagaram was 9.10 lakh cusecs. Similarly, the Sriramsagar project at Pochampad received 4 lakh cusecs and the storage presently was 68 tmcft.
Discussing the steps taken to rise to the situation, he said the entire government machinery was kept on high alert and even the Army was asked to position a couple of helicopters to rescue stranded persons. He appealed to people to refrain from going on adventurous drives on roads with culverts. Thousands of old and dilapidated houses were pulled down. Residents of houses caught in court cases were evacuated to safer places.
The situation was alarming in eight mandals of erstwhile Nizamabad and Adilabad districts where streams and rivulets were in spate.
Round-the-clock control rooms were set up at the Secretariat, GHMC and municipal administration department headquarters. There was also information regarding a cloud burst over a limited area of Navipet, Nandipet and Mudhole mandals.
OU exams put off
Meanwhile, the Osmania University has postponed exams scheduled for July 11 to 13, and said new dates would be posted on the website (www.osmania.ac.in) in due course. However, all exams scheduled for July 14 and thereafter will be held.
