Talking to The Assam Tribune, Dr Choudhury said that the Chief Minister had called him following the devastating floods last year to ask whether he would be keen on heading a commission to suggest measures to deal with floods. “I agreed to do so, but the Government is yet to issue the formal notification in this regard,” he added.
Dr Choudhury said that a few officials of the Water Resources Department visited him to take his suggestions on the other persons to be appointed as members of the proposed commission. The Water Resources Department also called him for a meeting but he refused to attend it till the formal notification is issued by the Government.
The former GU VC expressed the view that he was not satisfied with the preparedness of Assam to deal with floods and pointed out that the implementation of the projects should start on time to ensure their completion by April. He said that there must be some flaws in the system to deal with the situation. The officials concerned should start planning during the floods as they come to know about the breaches of the embankments and the plans and estimates should be completed by October so that the works can start by the first part of November and steps must be taken to ensure that the flood management schemes including plugging of the breaches of the embankments are completed by April.
Dr Choudhury expressed the view that there should not be any compromise in dealing with floods and erosion and the problem should be considered as a “life and death question”. He said that every year lakhs of people of Assam are rendered homeless while, the economy of the state, particularly the rural economy is crippled by floods and erosion and the Government must deal with the problem like facing a war. It is a fact that totally preventing floods might not be possible but efforts should be made at least to mitigate the damages, he added. It may be mentioned here that the delay on the part of the Government in releasing funds often delayed the flood management schemes, most of which are not completed before the onset of monsoon.
Commenting on frequent breaches of embankments in different parts of the State, Dr Choudhury pointed out that every engineering structure has a life span and over the years, only the length of the embankments has been increased with construction of new embankments, but necessary maintenance of the embankments is not done. He said that the Government must pump in massive investments to strengthen the existing embankments and to ensure their proper maintenance every year or should examine the feasibility of taking up alternative measures to deal with the problem.