VIJAYWADA: Heavy rains pounded different parts of Andhra Pradesh on Thursday, November 26, as Cyclone Nivar, labelled as a severe storm, hit the state. Heavy downpour continued in both Nellore and Prakasam districts due to the cyclone’s influence. The cyclone is expected to subsequently weaken further into a deep depression. Consistently, rainfall has disrupted normal life in Nellore, Gudur, Buchireddipalem and Ongole.
The Indian Meteorological Department has predicted ‘fairly widespread’ to ‘widespread’ rainfall with heavy falls at a few places, while extremely heavy falls are expected likely over some regions in the next 48 hours. Nellore district received almost 13.8 centimetre of rainfall on an average in the last 24 hours inundating low lying regions in Nellore and other places like Sulurpeta, Naidupeta, Kaligiri, etc.
Paddy crops raised in 25oo hectares and black gram crop in over 3,500 hectares in Nellore district were submerged due to the rainfall. Standing crops of almost 34,000 hectares, including cotton in 21,000 hectares, black grams in 4,500 hectares, etc were affected in Prakasam district.
Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy, Chief Minister, Government of Tamil Nadu, instructed the officials to take all the steps to protect the damage due to Nivar storm. Reddy said that officials should work on damage control caused by the cyclone and all the measures should be taken to rehabilitate the affected people.