Around 2.75 lakh people were shifted and more than 500 villages have been evacuated from the coastal regions in view of the Cyclone Vayu approaching the Gujarat Coast, the government said.
Gujarat government on Wednesday evacuated over 2.7 lakh people from 10 coastal districts as "very severe cyclonic storm" Vayu inched closer to the state coast and is expected to make landfall between Dwarka and Veraval on Thursday afternoon.
Columns of Army, NDRF personnel, Air Force helicopters and 300 marine commandoes were deployed for rescue and relief operations, while flight operations from five airports in Porbandar, Diu, Bhavnagar, Keshod and Kandla were suspended.
Around 2.75 lakh people were shifted and more than 500 villages have been evacuated from the coastal regions in view of the Cyclone Vayu approaching the Gujarat Coast, the government said.
Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani chaired a meeting with senior state officials, officers of the Army and NDRF and District Magistrates to take stock of the situation.
"47 teams of NDRF have reached Gujarat and over 5 more teams will reach by Thursday morning. Army, Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard have taken their positions. State Disaster Management is at work. Police patrolling will be done throughout the night so that no one is left in the lower regions," Rupani said after the meeting in Gandhinagar.
The NDRF teams have been deployed at Kutch, Morbi, Rajkot, Jamnagar, Dwarka, Porbandar, Gir Somnath, Amreli, Junagarh, Bhavnagar, Vadodara, Valsad, Surat and Gandhi Nagar; four teams have been pre-positioned at Diu for a prompt response, the government said.
Chief Minister Rupani said that all sea-related activities have been stopped and all departments have been put on alert. "Senior Ministers and Senior Secretaries have been sent to control rooms of district administration and they are monitoring the situation," he said.
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 "Cyclone Vayu (Photo: ANI)")
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