On June 6, 2020 Karnataka Revenue Minister R.Ashoka launched Meghasandesha App & Varunamitra web portal to provide real-time information and alerts on weather, rainfall, flooding in Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike(BBMP) jurisdiction. These were developed by Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre(KSNDMC), in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Science(IISc) under the project ‘Urban Flood Model’(UFM) for the city. The project is funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India(GoI)
- The app and web portal helps people & civic agencies to tackle rain related issues.
Gist about the app:
i.The bilingual app provides data on 3 main modules namely live weather, forecast, and safe routes. The live weather and forecast tabs provide location based information on the prevailing temperature, rainfall, wind speed and direction.
ii.The safe route tab provides information on live rainfall and road flood on all probable routes (location to destination).
iii.It provides data from 100 Telemetric Rain Gauges (TRG), 12 telemetric weather stations (TWS) and water level sensors installed and maintained at various locations.
iv.An emergency tab will help to connect with BBMP emergency control rooms. The app will provide safety tips on Dos and Don’ts during rain and flooding
Gist about the portal
i.The dedicated web portal aims to leverage technology driven solutions to manage and mitigate the Urban Flood & will also provide details on flood vulnerable areas in each zone.
ii.It has a real-time weather dashboard that provides zone wise weather information, location specific rainfall and flood, and colour coded information on flood severity.
Note– The GoI has set aside Rs 200 crore for disaster mitigation.
Key Points
Karnataka administration informed that Bengaluru has taken a demand driven Project on “Urban Flood Model (UFM) for the city which includes providing a hydrologic model and associated systems for issuing flood forecasts for Bengaluru city for different rainfall quantum and intensity.
About Karnataka:
Capital– Bengaluru
Chief Minister– B. S. Yediyurappa
Governor-Vajubhai Vala
