No Foreign Funding To Arunachal For Flood Prevention: Pema Khandu

Itanagar: Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Monday informed that the state government has appraised the Centre on the issue of non-availability of foreign funding to the state for flood protection measures due to China’s intervention and sought alternative funding to mitigate the sufferings.

Responding to a question raised in the house during Question Hour by Congress member Ninong Ering, Khandu said that the state government had already submitted proposals to the Centre for fund to cope up with the flood problem in the State.

China had on various occasions objected to the proposed funding to Arunachal Pradesh by Asian Development Bank (ADB), World Bank and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for flood protection projects.

Khandu informed that the fund allocated by the Centre under Flood Damage Relief (FDR) schemes was not adequate and the state government would soon take up the matter with the Niti Aayog so that additional funds could be availed.

Earlier, Ering while referring to the reported move of China to divert the Brahmaputra river (known as Siang in Arunachal) in the Xinjiang Province by constructing a 1000 km tunnel, want to know the steps taken by the state government to counter the move as per international water treaty.

Responding to Ering’s concern, state Water resources Minister Mama Natung informed the house that there was no official information on the development.

He, however, stated that since 50 per cent of the drainage area of Brahmaputra River is in China, the state government can do little to contain occurrence of floods in the state.

Replying to another supplementary, Natung informed that due to discontinuation of Flood Management Programme (FMP) by the Centre and lack of state funding on flood management, no tangible steps could be taken up so far.

“Under the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKYS) programme, the state government had forwarded proposal for 109 schemes to the Centre through the District Irrigation Project (DIP) for flood protection and irrigation,” Natung added.

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