In a major decision on Thursday, the Central Government approved a range of urban flood management and glacial lake outburst flood mitigation projects for several states, including the hilly states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand which were ravaged by rains last year.
A high-level committee, under the chairmanship of Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah, approved several disaster mitigation and capacity building projects for states today.
The meeting of HLC comprising Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Agriculture Minister Shivraj Chouhan and Vice Chairman NITI Aayog as members was held in here today.
The committee considered a total of nine proposals for funding from National Disaster Mitigation Fund (NDMF) and National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) to combat urban flooding in six cities, to mitigate Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) in four hill states and to strengthen fire services in three states.
The committee also considered a proposal to implement Yuva Aapda Mitra Scheme in all the 28 states.
Six projects of Rs 2514.36 crore clearer for urban flood management will cover Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Pune.
Three projects of Rs 810.64 crore under “Expansion and Modernization of Fire Services in the states” for Assam, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu were passed.
GLOF risk mitigation project proposal of Rs 150 crore for Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh was approved by the high-level committee which also cleared Yuva Aapda Mitra Scheme (YAMS) at an outlay of Rs 470.50 crore to be implemented in 315 most disaster-prone districts of for training of 1,300 trained Aapda Mitra Volunteers as Master Trainers and 2.37 lakh volunteers.