Flight operations have resumed after three days from Kazi Nazrul Islam Airport in Andal from today, and coal production from open-cast coal mines has also resumed from today as rainfall stops, and Damodar Valley Corporation has reduced the water discharges from its Panchet and Maithon dams, situated on the Bengal-Jharkhand border. “We are pleased to announce that, post the unprecedented natural disaster in West Burdwan, regular scheduled flights from Kazi Nazrul Islam Airport have resumed this morning,” said Kailash Mondal, director of the airport.

Flights from Durgapur to Mumbai, Durgapur to Bengaluru, Durgapur to Hyderabad, and Durgapur to New Delhi have operated today. Since the last three days, flight operations have been stopped after the area was inundated due to heavy rainfall. The KNI airport authority worked hard in a war-footing manner to restore normalcy. It has suffered huge losses due to three-day flight cancellations. Talking to The Statesman, Niladri Roy, director technical (operations) of central public sector Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL), said that the coal behemoth has suffered one lakhs of tonnes per day of coal production due to the inundation in its 25 underground coal mines.

“In coal mining areas, there has been 300 to 400 millimetres of rainfall in the past three days, leading to the severe loss of operations at ECL. Instead of usually twentyseven to twenty-eight coalloaded rakes dispatched to power plants in the country, ECL has been able to send only 15 to 16 rakes, which means about 10 to 12 rakes less in the past three days,” added Roy. Slowly, production has resumed today, and we hope that production will be normal tomorrow. Luckily, the power houses have sufficient coal storage to date, and from tomorrow, dispatches will not be an issue, he said. The 25 open-cast coal mines of ECL spread over West Bengal and Jharkhand produce 80 per cent of the total coal production of 1,20,000 tonnes per day. In West Bengal, ECL supplies rakes of power-grade coal to the power plants of the West Bengal Power Development Corporation and Damodar Valley Corporation.

As the rainfall has stopped in the upper catchment area of the Damodar River in Jharkhand, Damodar Valley Corporation has released 6,000 cusecs of water from Maithon and 43,000 cusecs of water from its Panchet Dam. It is likely that the discharge will further decrease tomorrow. From Durgapur Barrage, about 1,15,000 cusecs of water have been released today, which is still low compared to yesterday. The District Magistrate of Bankura, Siyad N, and the SP of Bankura, Vaibhav Tiwari, both visited and inspected the Durgapur Barrage last evening. They talked with the irrigation department officials and said that the people neighbouring Manar Char, Barjora and Sonamukhi areas have been alerted. The DM has said that the approach road will be repaired once the monsoon season is over.

In Asansol, a school student named Iftikar Ahmed (14) has been killed after he fell into an abandoned open-cast coal mine that has been filled up by heavy rainwater in the past few days near the blue factory under the Asansol north police station area. The ninth-grade student drowned yesterday afternoon, and the dead body was rescued this morning by police. So far, in the Asansol district headquarters of West Burdwan district, four people have drowned. Slowly, the water level of the rivulets, high drains and other water bodies has been decreasing as the rainfall has stopped since yesterday. West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee has instructed all the DMs and SPs of South Bengal districts to remain alert on Tuesday due to the high tide.