GUWAHATI, May 22 – Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today laid stress on solving the problems of flood and erosion. Once these problems are solved, the health of the State’s economy will undergo a fundamental change, he said while inaugurating a seminar on low cost technology for mitigation of flood and river bank erosion in the river Brahmaputra at the Assam Secretariat auditorium here.

Imphal, May 17: Three departments of the Manipur government — public health engineering (PHE), irrigation and flood control and forest — are about to join forces under one policy, set to be initiated by the PHE to conserve the state’s water resources. “A joint meeting of the three departments will be held soon at the chief ministerial level to chalk out a strategy to conserve water resources,” PHE minister Irengbam Hemochandra Singh said today.

Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today laid the foundation stone of the Assam Integrated Flood and River Erosion Risk Management Project at Jahirpur village in Gumi. The Rs 172.35 crore project at Gumi is funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

After laying the foundation stone for the project, Gogoi said that the Gumi project would be another milestone in the controlling of erosion and flood problems in the State.

GUWAHATI: Continuing its support for rural infrastructure development in Assam, NABARD has sanctioned two projects to the Assam Government under RIDF-XVII for a total sum of Rs 138.34 crores. Under the two projects, a total of Rs 16.73 crore have been sanctioned for 5 rural road projects in Golaghat district while Rs 121.61 have been sanctioned for 102 rural bridge projects in 26 districts of the State.

JAMMU: The State Executive Committee headed by Chief Secretary, Madhav Lal today cleared ` 14 crore out of the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) for clearing the liabilities on account of relief and restoration of public utilities in various districts of Jammu division, damaged due to flash floods last year.

Collector visits the completed revetment wall and ramp at Punavasal village

Flood prevention works taken up along the Kollidam river in Thanjavur district by the Public Works Department (PWD) are nearing completion. The works were started in October 2010. Out of the total works taken up at a cost of Rs. 106.22 crore, works to the tune of Rs. 93.34 crore have been finished so far. The rest will be completed before the end of March.

The World Bank will provide a financial assistance of Rs 1,250 crore for minor irrigation schemes in West Bengal to help the state raise farm sector output, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said here today. He also noted that not much work was done in West Bengal for undertaking minor irrigation projects and the state's foodgrain production has suffered due to this.