PASIGHAT, Aug 6: Pasighat West MLA Ninong Ering has written to Prime Narendra Modi regarding the need for a holistic system upgrade for disaster risk assessment and dissemination of information to the public in Arunachal, especially with regard to the Siang river.
“The Siang (Brahmaputra) river has once again become a threat due to a landslide that occurred at Nien-Ch’ing-Tang-Ku-La Shan, which has created a natural dam in Yigong Tsangpo, a tributary of the Yarlung Tsangpo in southern Tibet,” Ering said, and raised concern over the aftermath in case the dam bursts.
He highlighted the risk of outburst floods from glacial lakes in the future as all the major upstream rivers of Arunachal have “glacial lakes of varying volumes and different flood risks.”
“We need automatic weather stations deployed at all border points where rivers come in, including the Subansiri, the Lohit, the Zemithang Chu and the Siang,” he said, and suggested that the central water commission collect and disseminate advanced flow rate data.
Ering also suggested that the SDMA, the NDMA, the NRSC and the state remote sensing centres “work together with competent people regularly to integrate earthquake alerts, precipitate data and radar data in a model.”
Urging the PM to instruct the authorities concerned to look into the matter, Ering also requested that the Indian government ask its Chinese counterpart to “share the latest information about the river status, which has been stopped since the last two years.”
