NASHIK: After a long break of more than a fortnight, the rain god has finally made a strong come back in most parts of the district yesterday reviving hopes for the farmers for kharif sowing and a respite for Nashikites from scorching heat and the threat of water cut in the city.
It has been cloudy in most parts of the city since morning. It started raining after 1400 hours in the afternoon covering all the city areas including Nashik city and suburbs of Nashik Road, New Nashik, Satpur and Nashik tehsil. it rained about 45 minutes inundating city streets, market places. Water logging was occurred at many low lying areas making traffic crawl.
The monsoon arrived the state last Friday. However, the progress of the monsoon was slow. It was getting cloudy every day. But it was not raining. Yesterday, the meteorological department had predicted that the monsoon would reach all over Maharashtra in 48 hours. That came true with yesterday’s heavy rain.
In the meantime, BJP state general secretary and MLA Devyani Pharande demanded an inquiry into the irregularities in the works done before the monsoon. In the municipal area, the pre-monsoon works were required to be completed by June 6, but the municipality did a lot of irregularities in the pre-monsoon works, as a result of which the first rains inundated.
Appeal to use Damini app
The district administration has appealed to the people to use ‘Damini’ app, developed by the Ministry of Earth, as a precautionary measure to prevent loss of life due to the lightning strike during the monsoon season. This app can be downloaded from the Google Play Store.
The app shows the status 15 minutes before the lightning strike via GPS location. The people should move to a safer place as soon as it receives a lightning strike alert in the area around the user. The Disaster Management Department has also appealed not to take shelter under the tree at this time. The app successfully alerts citizens during monsoon.
Youth killed in lightning strike
In Sinnar tehsil, a youth identified as Ravindra Anand Pawar killed in a lightning strike in the first heavy rain. Elsewhere, there were no reports of any untoward incident.
Roads flooded in the first rain
Almost four hours of rains flooded the roads in the city. The pits dug for Smart City work were inundated. There was four-feet of water on Dahi Pool. The Saraf Bazar inundated as usual. rain water entered into many shops, People had to travel in knee-deep water to find a way out while the streams began to overflow.
Five more days of rain
In the next five days, thunderstorms with lightning are expected in some districts of the state under the influence of western winds. The meteorological department has forecast sparse showers in some places and torrential rains in scattered places.
