Andhra Pradesh government sets up central command control room to monitor situation arising from heavy rains

View of flooded National Highway 16 in Vijayawada on Saturday. | Photo Credit: GN RAO

The Andhra Pradesh government has set up a Central Command Control Room (CCC) under a committee of senior officials of the State Disaster Management Authority at Kunchanapalli in Guntur district for effective monitoring and coordination of rescue and relief (R&R) operations undertaken by various departments in the heavy rain-hit areas.

A GO (Rt.No.1514) was issued to this effect by Chief Secretary Neerabh Kumar Prasad on August 31 (Saturday).

It was stated that the control room was required to monitor the situation caused by heavy rains, flash floods, overflowing of reservoirs and submersion of low-lying areas, and to take R&R measures.

The 19-member committee is headed by Chief Commissioner of Land Administration (CCLA) G. Jayalakshmi, and includes, among others, Director of Disaster Management Ronanki Kurmanath, Joint Secretary (in CCLA office) N. Prabhakara Reddy, Director of Survey and Land Records Lathkar Srikesh Balajirao, Director of Municipal Administration M. Harinarayanan and Commissioner of Panchayat Raj and Rural Development M. V. R. Krishna Teja.

Besides this, the control room of Real Time Governance Society (RTGS) was activated under the aegis of Secretary (School Education) Kona Sasidhar and Special Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Electronics and Communications, B. Sundar.

They were tasked with monitoring feeds from 14,700 CCTV surveillance cameras, drone cameras and other available sources, and coordinating with the CCC room and district control rooms.