In a rather unusual development, no less than twenty districts in contiguous areas of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat had extremely high rainfall in the 48 hours ending at 830 am on Aug 23, 2020. Three of these districts had over 250 mm rainfall in this period, four others had between 200-250 mm, six each between 150-200 and 100-150 and one between 90-100 mm. This contiguous area broadly drains Mahi river to the West, Chambal to the North, Narmada to the South and Betwa to the East. These rivers, thus are now getting heavy flows, and will continue to get for the next few days, some of it from Chambal and Betwa will also end up in Yamuna and Ganga. It reminded one of the nightmarish memories of Sept 2019 when Gandhi Sagar Dam faced existential crisis and the flood peak downstream reached upto Farakka Dam, as CWC Flood forecasting director Sharad Chandra said in a television discussion recently. Continue reading “Central India Heavy Downpour brings back nightmare memories of 2019 Chambal Scare” →